Stark Transcendent
by Morta's Priest
Summary: There are many paths open to Tony Stark, billionaire arms merchant. In some worlds, he is destitute. In others, he is a knight in shining armor. And in a precious few, he just might transcend expectations altogether. The future is an unwritten page - who knows where it may lead? (Archive of the Spacebattles Quest.)
1. Arc 0 - Prologue

**Stark Transcendent**

Marvel / Iron Man

_This is an edited version of a Quest I am running over on Spacebattles. __It is intentionally written in second person, as if the reader is the protagonist, and on the forums people can vote for actions after each segment is put online, in an approximation of a choose-your-own-adventure book with more flexibility._

_Compiled here are some of the finished segments of the story, with the choices stripped out (you can see them on the original topic) so that it's a fairly coherent narrative. Note that each part is written quite quickly and without the extensive editing that other stories might receive, so it's possible that errors and contradictions slip in on occasion; pointing them out is appreciated as always._

_Being originally an SB quest, expect in this story a Tony Stark who is rather different from canon, with a definite SF-slant to the whole affair of superheroing and living in the Marvel universe, with some transhumanist under- or overtones. If you wish to join in, go find the original topic on SB - I can't post links in here._

_Cheers._

* * *

**Prologue : Funeral Pyre (1 - 5)**

Everybody knew your name, your reputation. They'd known since you first stepped out of your father's shadow, a bright star even compared to his brilliance. You were the child of a genius, and a genius in your own right, and that came with certain - expectations. But even through your misgivings, you took to the capriciousness of that fame, used it and molded it for your benefit.

You were Anthony 'Tony' Stark, billionaire arms-dealer and CEO of Stark Industries; the brain behind one of the largest high-tech companies in the world and a visionary by almost anyone's definition. People around you saw what they expected from such a person - an utterly confident, unwavering smart-ass that didn't back down from anything. You even convinced yourself of all that.

The media said that power corrupted, but if that were the case, corruption wasn't such a bad deal. The world lay at your fingertips, hung on your every word, and you felt utterly invincible.

You really should have waited for the other shoe to drop. This latest trip to Afghanistan was supposed to involve a routine demonstration of your wares, and a little visit to the troops. Mostly, you'd just joked with Rhodey and spent some quality time with the flight attendants - life was good.

_Too_ good, as it turned out.

It was funny that only while you lay dying on the desert sand, surrounded by the burning carcasses of Jeeps and soldiers alike, you finally realized how empty your death would be out here, how very few your mourners. You were an arms dealer, a merchant of death, and you'd been killed by your own weapons. It was a demonstration of irony so banal that you should have seen it coming by a mile.

It was then, delirious and bleeding out, that something flashed in front of your eyes - or behind them, perhaps, something _more_. A vision of wire and flesh, of potential unrealized, the shiver of machine code against the pulse of a heart. The momentary clarity spoke of possible futures, potential destinies that unfolded and refolded before you could take them all in. Were these your last minute regrets, then, your life flashing before your eyes? You almost rolled your eyes at how cliché that thought was.

Before you could grasp the meaning of the sensation, though, the world faded to white, and only a single image stayed with you. In your moment of dying, something _appeared _before your eyes.

You wanted to look away, aghast at the image that seared itself into your mind, but it was the only thing that was clear in all the chaos. You knew you were being pushed underwater, but that felt distant, irrelevant. Someone held you under, forced you to breathe and suffer. But all the while, the image refused to waver.

There was an eerie figure, its cloak darker than black should be, and it ran a delicate finger across your throat, across a neck that had no pulse, no breath. Your corpse's eyes were open and stared blankly into nothingness, but a smile was frozen on your face. The image was terrifying, ominous, because you knew what it meant.

The thing that held you was all too recognizable, the symbolism clear. It was Death. Death had found you, caught you in its chilled grip. But you recognized the expression on the corpse's face, on that mirror of your own, and a spark of hope alighted. Because in dying, you had succeeded at something, completed some great work. Even as you sailed across the river Styx, you had felt victorious.

Death's face resolved into something more recognizable in that instant, a pale woman's visage with a small smile curling around her mouth as she shook her head fondly. Fondly.

She looked up and met your stare.

* * *

"Gah!" You stumbled back on your cot, the glare of the tiny light above you was torturous in the enveloping darkness of the room. The last vestiges of your dream turned to startling wakefulness, and you took a long moment to reorient yourself and catch your breath.

Cold darkness had wrapped itself around you in the night, and the ratty excuse for a blanket you'd been given scarcely helped against the shivering as you imagined an icy finger crossing your neck. You focused on the present, and around you lay familiar piles of refuse, bits of metal, circuit boards and disassembled weapons came into view. Everything had the vague stench of dried blood, your blood, and you shuddered. Wonderful.

You remembered where you were, now. The cave. You were still in that fucking cave. Not dead, as you'd half expected, and not some hackneyed afterlife with harps or pitchforks or whatever. No - Death paid a visit, and then some bastard insurgents saved your life, locked you up in a hole in the ground, and made you build fucking missiles for them. This was hell of a different kind, perhaps.

"Well, shit." You breathed out slowly. "It wasn't a nightmare."

You had not closed an eye since the roadside incident without your mind rerunning the whole affair, repeating in excruciating detail the moment that a grenade had gone off right next to you, and the eerie feeling that had overtaken you. You'd been hit with enough shrapnel to gut a horse, and though your body armor had taken the brunt of the damage, even something like that was not strong enough to block Stark grenades fully.

"Ah, Mr. Stark. You're up," a voice spoke from a little ways away.

"Yep. Just listen for the angsty scream, and that's me," you replied dully, shaking your head to get rid of some of the cobwebs - quite literal ones, as the cave was riddled with creepy crawlies that hid from the sweltering outside air.

Ho Yinsen rubbed his hands together to warm his fingers as his tired eyes surveyed the room. Unlike yourself, your companion had been in custody for a few weeks already, forced to tend to the wounds of his captors. The man still had his own blanket hanging around his shoulders, but it was even smaller than your own. Yinsen's kind expression was marred by pain from the previous day, and the cold wasn't doing him any favors, either. Who knew it would get that bloody chilly in the desert?

"The next patrol is due within the hour, I think," Yinsen noted.

"Yay. 'Cos I can't get enough of those," you replied as you considered the little camera that hung above the only door out of this prison. You turned away from it, preventing any lip-reading, even if the crappy the resolution on those CCTV knockoffs would probably be enough to dissuade anyone who tried. "I bet they'll knock us around again. At least they left us alone last night, I suppose."

"True." Yinsen hesitated. "This was the second night they avoided waking us. They must have realized that even prisoners require some rest." He grimaced, looking away. "There are worse conclusions to draw, of course."

You snorted. "Right. Somehow, I don't think our captors are humanitarians. They probably know we're running on empty, and they just might kill us if they overdo it."

You touched your aching chest gingerly as you stretched, getting some feeling back in your limbs. An electromagnet was embedded in your sternum, a machine melded into your skin courtesy of Yinsen's battlefield medicine - the only way he knew to prevent shards of shrapnel from digging into your heart. The small car battery that kept the device charged sat on the ground besides you, looking entirely too primitive for comfort.

"Look, these guys are assholes, but they're not idiots. They've got to keep us at least somewhat sensible to do work, and I'm worth more to them alive than dead."

"Perhaps you are - but I am not," Yinsen responded with a pained smile. "If I become too weak, they will surely…"

"Stop that," you snapped irritably, and he paused. "No self-pitying, remember? You spent a day talking me out of my funk, so I'm returning the favor." You smiled with difficulty. "You'll get back to your family, and I'll get back to… my own people. We can continue mining all this old crap for some materials; that's not hard work. Taking things apart is easier than building them, anyway."

The old man frowned. "I suppose you know best about such things. What about - your plan to get out?"

"Yeah, yeah. I'm working on something," you said quickly, realizing just how little idea you had of what you were going to do about this mess. "Just… let's think about that later, okay? These yokels need me to build something, and I won't move a muscle without having you around. Until I figure something else out, we'll just have to stick to that arrangement. Easy."

Yinsen looked skeptical. "Hm. Easy."

"Hey, look on the bright side - we're left to our own devices. I've had worse employers," you joked, trying to relieve some tension, though it didn't really work. "I doubt these trolls know which way to unscrew, much less how missiles work, so at least we won't have too much interference or executive meddling. That's just trouble, let me tell you..."

Yinsen didn't respond, but you didn't miss the man's momentary grin.

Lugging along your battery, you went to inspect the results of the previous night's work, and it was not hard to fall back into old rhythms. You'd worked with fewer supplies than you had now, back when you were younger. Everything you made here would be a kludge, of course, without the appropriate tools - but at least you had some. Building a Jericho was completely out of the question, since you didn't even have half the requirements for one of those bad boys, and the thought of handing it over to these jackasses didn't appeal. But you had options.

According to Yinsen, this was your sixth day in captivity - the first and second you'd been knocked out, scarcely aware of what went on except brief flashes of pain and awareness, and that eerie image of your own death. The third day, when you'd finally woken up, you'd very nearly yanked out your glorified pacemaker right then and there, and then they had come to mess up the rest of your day.

Basically, you were in deep shit. But you weren't actually dead yet, so that was a plus.

"They will be expecting progress," Yinsen noted gently, his sad eyes meeting your own with an unidentifiable expression, seemingly reading your thoughts. "If we do not have something to show at the end of this week, I can't say what they'll do."

"Yeah, yeah. I know. And I don't know if help is coming, either." You grimaced at that thought, and while you made a show of messing around with your tools, your thoughts were not on building a Jericho, but on more practical matters.

* * *

There was something soothing about wielding a hammer, and prodding the sizzling fire as heated metal poured into a desired shape. You forged circles of hair-thin metal that seemed utterly fragile, but they did not break. You were working in a rhythm that you'd gotten used to with years of practice, that you'd _perfected_, and it helped calm your nerves. You were an inventor first, perhaps, but a mechanic second. This was in your blood.

You knew all too well that your best work, the most impressive creations that you laid claim to, had been born from necessity, under pressure. JARVIS was one of them - an autonomous AI with startlingly human qualities, already far more complicated and convoluted than any one man could understand. Such were the benefit and drawback of evolutionary algorithms, of course. You'd built him on a _dare_, betting a rather substantial amount of money over an idea you had. It was only when dear old dad threatened to squeeze closed the money faucet, that you'd kept fiddling with it for half a year before you even dared flip the switch, just in case it was a dead end street. And yet, it had worked.

You'd have to be a lot less careful this time around.

As you labored on your newest project, working off half-faded memories of your father's work, you glanced at Yinsen. The man did not betray much in the way of emotions, only rarely showing his disdain for your captors, but you knew something simmered below the surface. He was a good man, after all - and those were the worst to anger.

"You've been here awhile, haven't you?" you muttered offhandedly, startling the man from his musings. "Tell me - what is the deal with these people? I've been trying to figure out what they're hoping to accomplish. These don't exactly look like luxury lodgings, so I doubt they've got much in the way of capital. I doubt they're used to doing this sort of thing." You sniffed exaggeratedly. "The place stinks, too. You'd think they'd have the cash for flowery perfume or something."

Yinsen smiled thinly, his eyes meeting yours for but a moment. "I had considered the matter. Our captors call themselves the 'Ten Rings', and they have been present in this region for some time. I cannot say why they have changed strategies." He sighed. "I had heard only a few mentions of them before my capture. I had assumed them a dormant cell."

"Not anymore, clearly." You shook your head with a frown. "If they've only gotten active recently, I'm guessing these Ten Rings guys radicalized only weeks ago. It's no wonder I haven't heard of them, if that's the case." You shook your head. "Let me guess, it's our fault? Americans? Seems like that's the theme lately."

"I assume so." The gaunt man agreed, looking away. "Though, I'm sure such people as these would have found an excuse sooner or later. Money, more than likely." He paused. "Let me ask you something in return, Stark. I know why I was in the region, of course - this is my home. You do not have such an excuse."

"Isn't it obvious?" You slammed your hammer down more strongly than you'd intended, startling even yourself. "Look, we've met before, you know what I do. I make guns, and bombs, and other nasty stuff, and people want to buy all that, especially out here." You grimaced at that. "These last few days haven't been good on my conscience, needless to say."

Yinsen smiled. "Ah. Then perhaps this gauntlet - is not entirely for nothing. The great Tony Stark, brought low with his own designs..."

You rolled your eyes in exasperation. "Yeah, yeah. We'll have to get out of this place first. I can decide what to do about all of this... afterwards." You soldered together the Palladium rings you'd made with a cobbled-together power outlet, aligning them as best as possible. It would be a glorious mess without robotic assistance, but you had no real choice. "Peacenik hippie crap will need some practice, you understand."

"Hm. There is nothing wrong with peace."

You rolled your eyes. "Right. Let's discuss that when we're sipping Martinis on the beach, not locked up in the dungeons, shall we?" you argued mildly. "Which brings me to our escape. You have been here long enough to notice things, and if you've got enough energy to take potshots at me, I'm sure you've thought of _something_. Any ideas?"

Yinsen hesitated. "There are… some things I have seen." He paced, frowning. "I know that we cannot wait out a rescue. Our captors' patience runs thin already, and we are eating their food, drinking their water. It is likely that they already consider prisoners an unnecessary risk, and only greed is staying their hand." He rubbed his forehead tiredly. "Even if we had weapons to fight back with, though , I don't see how we could hope to defeat dozens. We would die in minutes."

"Dozens, huh," you said slowly. "Well, one step at a time, we can save the blaze of glory thing for better occasions. If we can't charge through them, and we can't wait it out, then what's left? Sneakiness, maybe?" You picked up the soldering iron again, gesturing towards the door with it. "Maybe, with a proper diversion and a good helping of luck, it might be possible to sneak out. I'm not one for stealth, obviously, but I can manage."

Yinsen shook his head. "Very dangerous. The instant they'd spot our faces, they would kill us."

"I am well aware of that," you admitted shortly. "What other options do we have, exactly? We're in a glorified scrap yard, not a gun store..."

Yinsen nodded. "There is an unsavory possibility, but one that at least has a chance," he said reluctantly. "We could - negotiate," he said carefully, frowning darkly. "You are being held for ransom, correct? You are more than rich enough to pay their demands, so you might be able to buy your own freedom…"

"And fund this place?" You looked around. "Granted, I could probably come right back and bomb this place to smithereens… Besides, given where my tech's been going anyway, I suppose I wouldn't make things much worse," you conceded. You paused for a long moment as your gaze lingered on one of the cameras. "I don't much like the idea, though."

Your eyes lingered on the crappy laptops that were among the supplies piled up in the corners. "...There is another possibility. We've got computers here, right? And something's bound to be hooked up to all those glorified webcams." You glance to the camera that is turned away from you. "Do you reckon these people have an internet connection?"

"Stark?" Yinsen inquired. "What -"

You raised a hand. "Hold on, I'm having a brainwave here," you muttered. "I'm thinking - I could build IEDs from all this crap around us; half of our supplies are already bombs, it's child's play. But they'd be essentially useless without knowing where exactly to plant them, or when to set them off. If we could see where everyone was, though... I could probably get us out of the caves. We'd still need a big diversion to break free. With the internet, that'd be easy."

The gaunt doctor raised an eyebrow. "Is it wise to rely on such things?"

"Maybe. I don't know yet." You raised the small device you'd been assembling, pushing the last connectors into place. With a hum the spherical device activated, lighting up with an unearthly white glow. "I'm done. I'll need your help with putting it where it needs to be. This beauty - this is an arc reactor on a tiny scale. It's old-school stuff, modernized. This'll _work_."

"...You intend to use that for something?"

"Well, there's one or two other ideas I'd like to pitch to you…"

* * *

From the moment you'd been taken, there was only one way this was all going to end, you knew that. Negotiation was not going to work with people who had nothing to lose, and there wasn't time for anything intricate or grand. You had to tackle this quickly and brutally if you wanted to have any decent odds of making it through alive. That was the only way you saw forward - and through.

You were never a chemist by trade, but you knew enough to be dangerous. More than enough, actually. For more than twenty years now, you'd dedicated yourself entirely to engineering, to the development of cars, missiles and guns. Before that, though, in the distant teen years that you sometimes tried to forget, you had experimented.

Back when your father was still alive, when you were the promising but unproven offspring, you had searched for approval, something you would never truly get. In an effort to impress, you wandered far outside your areas of expertise - and among those new roads was chemistry, helped along by a friend of the family, Obi. Among your first hand-designed concoction was Solution 4 - named after the problem it was meant to solve in the notebook you'd kept, and also a cheap chemistry pun. It had your name written all over it.

You were looking for knockout gas that worked swiftly, unerringly, and left no long-term issues. It was supposed to be custom-made for a gas grenade that could flatten a room before anyone had time to flee. It was a good idea, a nonlethal asset. You were confident in your understanding, and your formula - enough that you asked Obi to come watch. Only a single test run was ever run, animal only, late in the evening. You'd set everything up carefully, and your precautions worked as intended.

Obi helped the research disappear, forging the ledgers and destroying the small stockpile of Solution you'd built up. He never even read the unfinished paper. Solution 4 was intended to be a forgotten mistake, a nightmare silenced in the crib. You'd called it Pyre, for the burn-like blisters that it caused - but perhaps also because you'd touched the stove with that experiment, and were shown the dangers of assumptions.

And yet, there was a way in which Solution 4 might be revived, and one reason you would even dare to. Only you had kept the formula stored in your memories, and knew about the rather simple ingredients that could be used to cook it, given the right circumstances.

You'd just made enough to kill a hundred men.

"I'm not kidding here, Yinsen. We need to cover all our exposed skin," you warned sharply as you strapped a long strip of insulating material around your leg, wrapping it tight. "Put some metal plates underneath, since we won't be running anyway with these gas masks. They're heavy and restrictive - but they're also tough. And they have to stay on. Have to. If you have to choose between skin or even a whiff in your lungs, for God's sake, you should take the skin."

Yinsen's face was pale, his hands shaking slightly as he dragged the little wheeled contraption that you'd built towards the door. Constructed inside the casing of one of the missiles, it was a technologically simplistic device, designed only to vaporize and spread the contents of a centrally placed high-pressure tank filled with toxic gas. It would not take much to fill a room - and it would spread like wildfire through every crack and crevice, saturating the air as it went. Dragging the contraption along would be a pain, but it was the only surefire way you knew to make sure that the whole cave system was affected.

Solution 4 was the only way you knew to guarantee that nobody was left standing in the end. The perfect storm. A shiver ran down your back at the thought. No wonder Death looked at you so fondly...

"This - I did not think..." Yinsen said softly. "Chemical weapons, Stark?"

"Necessary evils. But it is the best solution. Is it any more cruel than shooting people? It is certainly less painful," you argued, uncomfortably aware of the contents of the vat, and how the technical truth didn't really describe what you'd made. "Any decent plan we have involves killing our way out before we got murdered ourselves - and these people are guilty of far worse than just simple murder. Is the method really the hang-up now?"

Yinsen sighed, looking away.

However much Yinsen clearly disliked the whole affair, he went along with preparations anyway, insulating himself as well in the partial darkness, well outside the reach of the cameras due to his small stature. Your helmets came last - bulky and tight around the temples, with only two tiny eye-slits covered in plastic to give a view of the outside, and a large, makeshift filter attached to the bottom which was covered in leftover wires from the heavy-duty air filtration system it'd been salvaged from. The moment you slipped your own mask on, you knew the clock was running.

"We have about half an hour before these filters clog up," you warned, your breath rattling through the confined space. With a simple flick of a switch and a soft hiss, Solution 4 began leaking into the room; it was odorless and close enough to transparent that you could only detect the slightest of ripples in the air as it billowed outwards to fill the room. It didn't seem like Yinsen had even noticed. "Here we go."

You did not wait for a response, pacing to the door and giving it a good kick - once, twice. You could hear the stumbling on the other side, as someone messed with the lock and shouted something in Arabic, cursing in languages that you hardly even recognized. There was a click, a creak, and the barrel of a gun was the first thing to appear through the crack.

There was barely any sound, but you knew exactly what to listen for. The briefest of inhalations, more likely the second breath than the first. Then the guard's lungs refused to obey, seized up. You had noticed that reaction in rats, rabbits, a few monkeys - never in humans, of course - but you recognized it instantly. Solution 4 was a Mammal-Killer, after all - and people were mammals.

The first victim fell, not even trying to catch himself as his skull cracked against the ground. Not that he could react by now, as the Pyre had reached his brain stem, shutting down his somatic nervous system. Soon after, the brain itself would die, frozen in mid-thought. It was a quick, painless death - too fast to react to. Solution 4 was instant knock-out gas alright - of the most permanent kind.

The door slipped open, creaking on its hinge as it revealed the hallway beyond. The first to fall looked to be barely thirty years old, his face contorted with anger, his hands still clasped around his gun. A few stray drops of blood were leaking out of his ears, but there was no other sign of injury at all, despite being slumped back on the ground.

The silence of a tomb surrounded you as you stepped out. The first signs of Solution 4's efficiency became clear quickly - more than a dozen bodies were spread out on the ground in the direction of the outside, a few drops of blood visible at their eyes and ears. They had never had time to close their eyes, or to turn around - they'd dropped where they stood. None of them had even been able to yell out.

"My God…" Yinsen whispered in an odd tone, slowly following you, pausing momentarily at every body. "Stark -"

"If you're going to tell me this is a war crime or something - I know." You grimaced as you tried to ignore your shivers. "Pyre is not on any banned list, of course, but it very well should be. But it's too late to rethink things now - we have to finish what we started. You can curse me later; the beast is loose."

It was nearly five minutes after the gas had been released, and the base was still deathly silent. There was not a single sound except the scraping of your boots, the squeaky wheels of the vaporizer you were dragging along, and your breath. The rest was just silence - the silence of the grave.

"None of them have masks on," Yinsen observed morbidly, shuddering as he passed the people that were draped through the corridors.

"There was no time - not nearly." You shook your head. "Leave the Solution here," you instructed. "We're far enough through the caves that saturation is inevitable - and what remains of the stuff will degrade on its own within a few hours. It's nasty - but it's not particularly stable."

Yinsen nodded to you, almost eager in abandoning the device.

"In any case, the gas will not persist for very long outside," you said after a long moment, looking down the winding corridor and hoping for signs of daylight. "At least, they might have had enough warning to put on a mask - so we'll need to tackle this differently."

Yinsen took a deep rattling breath in his mask. "How? Do you have yet more monstrosities up your sleeves, Stark? More horrors?"

You grimaced. "Unfortunately - always."

* * *

You could tell from the way he glanced at you, eyes barely visible behind the slits in his mask, that Yinsen was not very pleased. Honestly, you weren't terribly happy with the lengths you'd taken to end the mess you were in - but you had to stick with your plan. This was certainly not the first time you were responsible for people dying; not by a long shot, given the kinds of things you built for a living. You had to suck it up, and deal with it.

It was the silence that was the creepiest of all, even now - it reminded you that the Pyre spread through these caves without encountering any resistance, flowing through cracks and holes to reach its targets, killing without warning. Most of the extremists would have been sleeping, as it was late - they would not even have had the instant of recognition between the freezing of the muscles and their collapse. They were just - gone.

You could see why Yinsen was revolted, even though he acted to assist you. He was smart enough to know that there was no going back. It was doubtful that your would-be-friend would ever trust you again, though.

"The cave has been saturated," you said shortly. "If anyone were still alive - I think we would have noticed by now. They might have gas masks stashed away somewhere, but I doubt any of our 'friends' swaddled themselves in thick cloth. The lesions -" You shook your head. "  
"Trust me, they wouldn't last very long."

Yinsen took a shuddering breath, though it might just be the rattling of the filter that made it sound that way. "What comes next?"

You gestured down the hallway. "It's evening - we have the cover of darkness, even if we'll be heard coming from a mile away in these suits. It shouldn't matter, even if there's anyone still alive out there - they won't dare come close to the entrance if they know something bad was in the air. Odds are, though, that any survivors have hightailed it out."

"And…?"

"We take shelter. There's Pyre everywhere - we have to find somewhere it hasn't reached yet. Outside, needless to say." You turned around, taking a few steps back to the vaporizer that still lay abandoned in the middle of the corridor. With a quick twist, you pulled a handle to the side, and you felt it warm up under your touch. "We have five minutes to find a spot."

Yinsen twitched, and did not protest as you pulled him along. You took long paces towards the cave's mouth, focusing on reaching it above everything else, ignoring even the bodies that you had to step over, some of which had a fearful expression frozen on their face. These men, then, had seen death coming - had seen it take their allies moments before the Solution reached them.

There was an ominous click from right besides you.

A bullet ricocheted off your helmet, burying itself in the cave wall, and you threw up your hands just in time for two more bullets to bury themselves into your forearm, just barely nicking the sheet metal you'd shoved in between your skin and the thick insulation that kept you safe.

"Look out!" Yinsen cried, bringing forward a gun that he had to have taken from one of the dead, firing a burst into the dark corridor that split off from yours. There was no shooter in sight - but it was not hard to pinpoint where the shots had originated. Someone from inside had survived, had gotten his hands on a weapon and come hunting.

An eerie prickling sensation started under your protective layers, right where the bullets had penetrated. You cursed softly as you tried to find a weapon.

"STARK!" a voice cried, but it was not Yinsen's. There was fury in that cry, hatred. You recognized it - you'd heard it before. He was the man who had interrogated you, who was there when you'd been pushed underwater time and again, pushing you to the edge of drowning. "YOU! YOU DID THIS!"

You didn't answer as you dove for the nearest corpse and ripped a Kalashnikov from his rigid fingers, slapping yourself for your reliance on the Solution. Two more bullets buried themselves into your excuse for armor - one slammed harmlessly into metal, but the other did not. You felt it rip through your side with a flash of pain - and through the wound was very shallow, that didn't matter.

There was no time to rethink things; you knew what you had to do. Ignoring the bastard ringleader that was hiding out somewhere in the dark, you dragged Yinsen along towards the exit, as the latter kept firing. There was a glimpse of a gas mask as you turned the last corner and you left the rocky protection of the tunnels. You barely glanced outside before barreling into moonlight; you had no choice.

Time was running out.

Your mind was beginning to fog up - you could feel your movements slowing. It was the Pyre. You hadn't breathed it in, or you'd have been a corpse already - but you'd been exposed. Unless you got out fast, there wouldn't be any escaping at all. Transfer through the skin was much slower than through the lungs, especially in tiny doses, but in the long run it could be just as lethal. You looked around desperately for a safe place, and though your eyes had difficulty focusing, you saw something you recognized.

A few dozen feet from the cave mouth, a familiar metal shipping crate had been parked, still mounted atop the stolen truck that had been transporting it inland. The doors were closed, but the truck's tires didn't seem particularly stressed - it had to be empty. It was massive, probably meant to transport high-value goods, and above all it was untainted.

"Cover my ass!" you instructed Yinsen as you ran over to it, cursing your leg as it almost gave out. The door was not locked, thankfully, though the latch was tight. It took a few moments to tear it loose, and to drag yourself bodily into the space behind it. Yinsen followed you, still holding his gun as he glanced between you and the dark.

"He's still out there!" Yinsen said sharply "He'll find us!"

There was a distant rumble, a creaking of metal. As bullets landed at your feet in the ground, and bounced off the heavy metal door of the container, you acted, dragging Yinsen in as you kicked at the latch. The container's door slammed closed, locking you into perfect darkness. The rumble outside grew louder, and it turned to a screech - then a roar.

"It doesn't matter anymore," you said faintly, as sparks seemed to ignite behind your eyes, the signs of Pyre messing with your neurons or your retina. You grimaced as your fingers twitched in protest. "It's over. Everything is dead, now."

That's when the fireball arrived, to prove your words. Your container was hit by a wave of force so powerful that you could hear the truck's tires popping, its frame groaning as the whole thing was shoved against the mountainside. Then the real shock wave arrived, and for a few long moments, you had no idea which way was up, or down. You were fairly sure you'd flown for a bit, there. The landing was harsh, but you'd been able to hold onto the irregular grooves on the side walls, and rode out the destruction.

This was the most dangerous aspect of Pyre - something you'd discovered but never disclosed, even to Obi. Far from being inert, your Solution was an extremely reactive substance, given the right catalyst. The activation energy for a reaction was high, and it would take a hell of a temperature to get it going - but when it did, it was monstrous. And you'd put twenty-seven butane torches under a canister filled with the stuff.

You knew exactly what happened next; you'd seen the simulations a thousand times.

The flames weren't yellow or red; instead, a blue-white inferno burst forth from the cave system that could not contain its exothermic fury, and the narrow corridors served as the barrel of the world's biggest cannon, filled with explosives and fuel. The titanic explosion rippled out from the cave's entrance, blasting a crater into the side of the mountain as it tore its way to freedom, covering a square mile with burning gaseous death. The same square mile which happened to be dominated by huge piles of Stark ammunition and stolen missiles.

If a small nuclear weapon had gone off, you were pretty sure it could not have made a much bigger boom. Even with a helmet on that dampened your hearing, your ears were ringing and your teeth chattering. Missiles blew up as their jury-rigged triggers gave in, and a chain reaction billowed outwards that finished what the Pyre started. A huge plume of fire rose up into the sky, brighter than the moon, and it scorched the night like a flare that even neighboring countries would be hard-pressed to miss.

Your shipping container wasn't safe from the onslaught - it was made of thick metal, built to last, but you could hear it buckle under the stress of the shock waves. You could feel the sweltering air as it rushed in through minuscule gaps and crevices. You had already backed away as far as you could, towards the back end which was laying against the rocks, and Yinsen had followed without comment - and it was still nearly too much.

If anyone else in the base had survived your toxic cocktail before, it didn't matter much now. Because there was no base.

It took a long time for silence to fall.

"...And now we wait," you said, slumping against the side of the container. You pulled off your helmet, taking a long, deep breath, much to Yinsen's shock. You smiled tiredly. "Don't worry. I can't feel the prickling anymore - the gas didn't get to spread here much. The fire burned off the rest, I'm sure." You sighed, dropping the heavy metal helmet as you grimaced. "Right - that's what hurts... I think I've been shot. _Ow_."

* * *

It took the army almost three hours to pinpoint the site of the explosion - but what they found were the remains of a terrorist camp that had been utterly decimated by the weapons they'd stolen, and nothing more. There was no cave system anymore, nor any chemical samples, as they were certainly hopelessly degraded by heat and a thousand explosive residues from weapons both ancient and new.

Rhodey was the one that heard the banging on the shipping container's walls. If he noticed the piles of insulation material and makeshift helmets that were piled up in the corner, he did not comment on them. Yinsen had even hugged the man, which was disturbing for everyone involved.

You did not admit what you'd done - not even to your best friend. Yinsen would certainly not blab about it, at the very least to protect his own skin, but he did thank you for saving your life. Whatever goodwill you might have had, however, would take much longer to recover. The army, of course, would realize that you'd set off a hell of an explosion - but as long as that was all, they would not hound you too much. You hadn't exactly taken out toddlers here.

As you flew back across the ocean, though, side swaddled in bandages and fingers still occasionally twitching as your nerves got over the shock they'd had, you finally had time to reflect a little, to think about the consequences of your choices. For one day, Solution 4 had been in use again - and you were not sure if anyone would forgive you for its use, if they ever found out. You were not entirely sure you could forgive yourself.

The image of Death loomed again in your memories, and you shuddered.

You were alive, and that meant you could change. Whatever it was that you wanted to be now, you were not the arms merchant from before. Whatever illusions about your trade you'd had were gone, and you saw all too well how terrible your creations could be in the wrong hands, or perhaps, even in the right ones. Perhaps you'd learned something.

Wherever you went from here, and with it Stark Industries, it would have to be somewhere new. Somewhere better. After the burning of the funeral pyre, you could use some fresh air.

* * *

**Interlude - Deadpool**

Well, how about that.

An arrow.

There was an arrow in your head.

Thinking was not so good. Nor moving. You have the definite sensation that the arrow has something to do with it. Who used arrows, anyway? It was the twenty-fifth century - twenty-third? Something like that. The Laser-age was around the corner, and so was shooting people with beams and stuff. Bullets were good, too. You liked bullets.

The brain problem was annoying. _Your father smells like elderberries!_ Right, so was that.

"You don't die from anything, do you?" a voice said from somewhere close. It came from a burly guy with a beer gut, a meat cleaver clasped in his hand, and his expression betraying his intent to carve. "How the hell am I supposed to…?"

You managed to catch your breath, and declared with as much authority as you could manage:"Macaroni and cheese puffs!"

Okay, maybe the brain thing was more than just _annoying_.

You knew Wolvie had his brain messed before - and it had never come back quite right. You were probably bleeding into your cerebellum, and even your ridiculous healing might just not be able to keep up, if you did anything more drastic. Brain damage - that shit was dangerous.

Eh - not like you were using your head much. _Fuck it._

You yanked at the shaft of the arrow, still lodged in your temple, and pulled with as much strength as you could manage. There was a horrifying slicing sound, the gurgling of blood - maybe some brain matter came out, alongside a few more IQ points.

For a glorious moment, the colors smelled like awesome, the air tasted like yellow and scantily clad Jean Grey, and the meat cleaver that approached your face looked like cinnamon and chimichangas.

Then your head cleared a bit, though your brain still merrily chirped away. _'In Mortal Danger. Behind You, a Psychopath. Cut his Brains Out.'_ Okay, was that a fucking haiku?

You managed to stumble out of reach of the burly dude with his overcompensating weapon - and that had no implications about yourself, thank you - and frowned. "That… kinda tickled," you declared, holding one hand to the dripping hole in your head as you grasped for your gun - any of them, really - but you found nothing below the waist.

No wonder it was so cold down there. Your belt had been sliced off at some point, and it was lying a few dozen feet away, along with all its fancy pouches - and your pants.

Your star-emblazoned boxers were on proud display.

_Looking - actually, _good_ is an overstatement._

"This was supposed to be easy! God damn it, die already!" The crazy butcher guy exclaimed, and his cleaver headed right for you again - no style, just strength. You idly noted that you'd never actually seen this dude before; he was certainly not the asshole that had put an extra face hole in you.

"I would make a cutting comeback, but I think the part of my brain responsible hasn't grown back yet. Would you do with shitty puns or ripping off other people?" Still a little loopy from the hit, you barely remembered that meat cleavers were bad news - but there was plenty of time left to counter the next slash.

The cleaver carved deeply into your completely unprotected shoulder; you knew that it would heal up in no-time, anyway. That was kind of like a counter, right?

Enough was enough - fun was over. You shoved four feet of razor-sharp sword through the guy's face in retaliation, and sighed as he slumped to the ground. It wasn't the cleanest kill you'd ever made - not by a long shot. But you were still standing, and the glorified butcher was leaking all over the floor.

That was kind of like victory, right?

Right. Dead guy on the floor, pants on the floor - _everybody walk the dinosaur._ It was a bit confusing and annoying - not your usual afternoon. Not two hours earlier you'd been slumming in your pajamas, watching Jerry Springer reruns as you stuffed your face.

Then - you'd been shot in the face from out of nowhere! And now your brain had, for some reason, started talking to itself in second person, and you were confusing yourself with every _you_ that didn't seem to fit. Arrows to the head were definitely bad news - _you better keep a note, Wade._

The butcher didn't have anything on him that suggested he was a hitman, nor an explanation for why he'd dropped you off in the middle of the fucking desert. In fact, after rifling through his pants and socks, you didn't even come across more than a few hundred bucks. This was just some dead schmuck who had been hired to make a body dump - and nobody had told him about the healing thing.

You were in costume, and you still had your sword with you. Who the fuck was this stupid?

The only thing worth stealing was a shitty cell phone - a Nokia from a year you tried desperately not to remember; you'd spent most of it trying to get drunk, and failing. There was only a single saved message on the thing, a code. You recognized it - you'd used it yourself on more than one occasion. Mercenary shorthand, of the most lethal kind.

They were instructions for a hit - a big-time, high-grade one. Some rich businessman type with three-hundred security agents, probably. Should be fun.

The phone didn't belong to the guy you'd just killed, obviously; it had to have been slipped into the dumper's clothes. Probably by that damned arrow-guy.

With that, your brain finally caught up with the plot.

"Oh, fucking hell. It was Bullseye," you cursed. _"Fuck everything with a two-by-four."_

This was _so_ not a good way to get hired.

* * *

**Author's Note** : As this is a quest, the updates will come in blocks...


	2. Arc 1 - Makeshift Hero (1)

**Arc 1 - Makeshift Hero (1 - 5)**

_Home_. You'd never really thought about the concept much, putting it aside as an ideal - but perhaps you'd finally found one after all. You hardly cared for the ancestral Stark house that your parents had favored - perhaps because of the drab scenery, or maybe because of the company you'd kept. Regardless, it was just a _place_, now.

Stepping off the plane into the slightly stuffy Californian air, though, you let out a sigh of relief that was far more heartfelt than you cared to admit. Home. A few dozen feet away, one of your cars was parked on the tarmac, shepherded by half a dozen company ones. Happy raised a hand in recognition, and a smile worked its way onto your face. Yes, this was home - or the closest thing you knew.

Now if only you could stop the shivering.

"They caught on pretty quick," the security agent to your side murmured a little irritably. "I'd hoped we had a few more minutes…"

"You know what they say. The only thing that travels faster than light is a rumor," you said, smiling thinly. "Believe me, on occasion the paparazzi have known things about me that I hadn't even discovered yet myself…"

Despite your attempts at humor, you descended to ground level with trepidation, inching towards the sharks that had gathered to take some nibbles. It was all going very quickly - you'd barely had time to debrief in Afghanistan before you'd been shoved onto the plane, and you'd missed the lion's share of your time on board to sleep.

For a moment, you wished Dr. Yinsen had accompanied you - had chosen to take your offer of temporary asylum. You could understand the man's hesitance, though, in lieu of your recent choices, and decided to leave the matter for a later time.

"Mr. Stark!" breathless voices exclaimed, and you rubbed your forehead tiredly. A few dozen reporters had gathered already. Usually that would have been an opportunity for a little PR - but you weren't feeling it right now. Your head was too full with recriminations and worries to deal with that crap. In fact, you were not sure you would be making any sense right now.

"Don't mind them. Can you just get me to the car?" you murmured, just loud enough for the agent next to you to pick up on it. It was no real surprise that nobody had left you alone for even five minutes since the storage container; you'd just been missing for a full week, presumed dead until the Ten Rings had put out their ransom video. These people were just doing their job.

"Mr. Stark - how are you recovering from your ordeal?" a particularly high-pitched voice screeched over the throng as you reached the bottom of the stairs, faced suddenly by a dozen cameras and twice as many wide-eyed faces. "Is it true that you set off an explosion, killing dozens of -" She was cut off by someone shoving her aside.

You turned slightly to answer the question, to make _some_ defense of your actions. For once, for the first time you remembered, you hesitated. The words would not come, and all you could think of was the dead eyes of your captors, slain by something they could not even see. Killed by the monster you had unleashed - a decision that you could barely justify even now.

Abruptly, you turned away towards your car, your face as white as a sheet. You heard the clicks of cameras, saw the flashes from the corner of your eyes. That picture would be on every paper - you were sure of it.

'_Stupid move, kid. Stupid. A PR nightmare_.' You could almost hear Obi's disapproving words echoing in your skull, and you closed your eyes as you reached the car. For a long instant, you just leaned against the side, taking deep breaths to try and calm your racing heart.

You had not had a moment to yourself since the cave, not an instant to process anything. You never thought you could be overwhelmed like that - but clearly, you were wrong. Wryly, you realized you were just a little more _human_ than you'd ever thought.

"Happy," you said after a moment, opening your eyes, and you took in the man's worried expression with a little surprise. Harold Hogan had worked loyally for you since you were eighteen years old, so of course he would care - but it was still a shock every time you noticed. You were not exactly good at making friends, after all.

"Mr. Stark… Tony," Happy said after a few moments. "Are you alright…?"

You did not know what to answer to that question - 'no' was an understatement - before you realized that the din behind you was getting awfully loud. You were in no shape to answer questions - nor to face anyone from your company. Odds were that you'd start spouting things you could not take back, admitting to things you shouldn't, or worse. No, you needed some alone-time right now. A moment to decompress.

"Just… just take me home, would you?" you said at last, plopping down roughly in the back seat of the car, quickly closing the door behind you. "And give me a phone. I need to call - " You hesitated, but there was really only one person who had any inkling of what was going on. "I need to call Rhodey."

Happy nodded, and something like relief seemed to flash across his face. "Of course, sir. It's good to have you back."

* * *

"JARVIS - let there be light!"

"_Immediately. Welcome back, sir. Dum-E and Butterfingers were getting worried,"_ Jarvis replied easily as the Garage lit up like a Christmas tree - dozens of little LEDs brightened, and the slow glow of the lamps exposed the workbenches and computers that had been silenced since your departure. _"As was I, of course."_

"Yeah, missed you too," you replied, and you honestly meant it. "I hope you kept the place running without me? Ah, what am I saying. Of course you did. Someday, I'll find you tinkering on a bride in the off hours."

"_I will endeavor not to disturb you,"_ JARVIS replied sardonically. _"The Garage is in working order."_

You nodded in relief, and smiled. There wasn't just one 'Garage' of course - it was a nickname, of a sorts, that seemed to fit just about every workplace you'd ever constructed. It all started in a literal garage - the one back in the old house, and perhaps the only spot of it that you'd ever actually liked. In a way, you had always carried along that little part, poured into many different shapes as the years went by. Here, more than anywhere else, you could turn ideas into reality. If Malibu was home - then this was _home_.

"Jarvis - play me some AC/DC, and turn on the news, would you?" You stretched, sighing deeply. Even just being home again was doing wonders on your nerves - it was familiar, private. All the little gizmos spread around the corners, devices that you'd built more for their novelty than any practical purpose, reminded you of the long afternoons you'd spent just tinkering. This wasn't where you ever built missiles, or guns - that was company work. This was where you built dreams.

The first notes of Thunderstruck echoed through the basement, at the overly loud volume that everyone except you found unbearable, and the televisions blinked on. One played the video that accompanied JARVIS's chosen song - the other two were tuned to news channels, and you had an immediate urge to look away. Your face was plastered across both of them.

"Well, at least I can't hear them criticizing me," you murmured distractedly as you shook your head. For a few minutes, you just stood there, listening to the music, hoping that it could help you deal with the bullshit that you'd just survived. Distantly, you could hear JARVIS's voice. It was probably not the first time he'd spoken.

"_Sir?"_

Someone tapped you on the shoulder.

You _reacted_.

You were suddenly on the ground, and did not remember how you'd ended up there. Your hand hurt - why? You glanced up, and stared in surprise. Rhodey - James Rhodes, the one person you might unambiguously call a friend - stood over you with a look of chagrin on his face, rubbing his cheek.

"Was that entirely necessary, Tony?" he asked loudly over the music.

"Ow," you managed in return, narrowing your eyes. Your side hurt, but that was probably just the grazing wound you'd gotten in Afghanistan. Your hand, though - that was from the present. That meant you'd lashed out, so startled that you'd been reduced to crude fight-or-flee responses, courtesy of that damn cave. And Rhodey's kung-fu was clearly way better than yours. "Sorry about that."

"JARVIS - turn down the racket," Rhodey stated, and the music was swiftly reduced to a fraction of the previous volume - it might as well have been silent. "Well…" Rhodey said. "It figures _this_ is what you'd decide to do when you return home. Get up."

Right, you were still on the floor.

* * *

A few minutes later, sipping on a cup of strong coffee, you watched your own face come by on the television. Any other day, you might have let your inner narcissist have its fill - or the outer one, for that matter - but today you could not. The images were too cold, too stark - hah - and all too telling. That moment you had looked for the reporter that asked you about Afghanistan, about the killings, you had not realized the horror-struck expression that flashed across your face.

"...It was far worse than what we saw, wasn't it, Tony?" Rhodey inquired tiredly. "The doctor wanted to schedule a visit with a shrink, like usual, but I figured you'd seen worse things. It was just a week, you know? I thought that whatever happened, you would spring right back…"

"Maybe I will," you said after a few moments. "You're right - I wouldn't visit a shrink unless you dragged me in by my hair. Not after…" You shook your head. "I appreciate that you came so quickly, actually. You almost beat me here."

"Well - I sort of expected you'd want to be alone," Rhodey admitted. "I figured it was pretty bad if you called of your own volition."

You shrugged. "I've got JARVIS and the bots, I'm never entirely alone here. I just figured you could help prevent me from drowning in a bottle." You glanced up, smiling slightly. "Besides, you're my friend, sort of. I think so, anyway."

"Don't be stupid," Rhodey answered immediately, and you both knew the question was routine by now - a little in-joke. "Anyone who can put up with you, and stick around - they're friends. I figured you'd have realized that after the third time I dragged your sorry ass home after you'd gotten into bed with the wrong people. _Literally_ in one case."

"That was an accident!" you protested.

Rhodey sighed. "You'd think you'd realize she was a man before she pulled off her panties."

"I was drunk!" you argued heatedly. "Besides, that was one of the best plastic surgery jobs I'd ever seen…" You shut up before you could make yourself look any worse.

Rhodey nodded slowly. "I don't suppose you want to talk about it?" he inquired, and you were fairly certain he wasn't talking about your unfortunate dalliances.

You shrugged. "Well, there's - not much more to tell than you already know, I think. I nearly died - twice, I think - and the only thing keeping my ticker going is this." You shoved down your shirt a little, though the glow of the arc reactor was visible through it. "I built this, in case you were wondering. At some point, I'm pretty sure I was tortured, though I can't really remember much of that. Just that I was drowning. The bastards put me to work afterwards. They made the fatal mistake of giving me so many resources to play with. The day you found me - me and Dr. Yinsen broke out. Sabotaged the bombs and set them off."

"They were Stark property," Rhodey acknowledged. "I suppose you knew how they worked."

You winced slightly, nodding. "...Yeah. They had an awful lot of the stuff lying around - far more than has actually gone missing, I think. I mean, this one place had dozens of large bombs lying around, and last I checked we've been short only four. Unless someone went on a stealing spree, that means _bad news_…"

Rhodey grimaced. "Shit. Tony, that means -"

"Yeah," you agreed immediately. "I'm thinking that's something you'll have to help me with. Someone is mooching off the military contracts, I'm thinking." You nodded slowly. "We need to figure out if there's more production that's off the books, or if someone is just manipulating the numbers." You shrugged. "And then there's the company to deal with."

"I can get some paperwork sent over here, I suppose - Pepper's good at accounting, I'm sure she can help figure out what's going on. Don't worry - I'm not just the military liaison because of my winning smile." He nodded slowly, then paused. "Wait, what about the company?"

You hesitated for a long time. "...It's - I've been thinking. About what I'm doing, I suppose." You frowned. "Our bombs are good, very good. But this mess made me think about the things I haven't been doing. For a defense contractor, we've done rather little in the way of defense, don't you think? Or anything except weapons, really." You cocked your head to the side. "Stark Industries has gotten to be massive - but we're basically war profiteers, and nothing else."

"You do realize I'm in the military?" Rhodey asked rhetorically.

"Yeah, but..." You tapped the arc reactor in your chest, and smiled. "Consider this. This thingy here? It could run an electric car for years, if I perfect it. Or a good-sized skyscraper, no charging required. This is the gas-killer, Rhodey." You sat back, and smiled. "Right now, it's too easy to weaponize - but I can fix that. I have the key to the energy-crisis, and Stark Industries could be the one to make it happen. We wouldn't need the military anymore."

Rhodey just stared. "...Are you sure?"

"Yes. You remember the Repulsor-prototypes?" You grinned, then. "They worked - but they lacked the power to run them. But now I have that. I'm sitting on _reactionless drives_ here. I have in my sole possession the _holy grail of rocketry!" _You stood up, itching to get to work - inspired, perhaps. "I could make personal jet-packs a reality! And let's not forget about JARVIS, shall we?"

"_I would appreciate that, sir,"_ the AI chimed in.

"Autonomous artificial intelligence. Enough said," you noted. "I was way too caught up in things to realize what I had down here - the stuff I'd tinkered with, but never had real time for. These terrorists gave me a few days of freedom - and I built a miniature arc reactor. Consider what I could do with a month of doctor-mandated rest?" You smiled broadly. "I think it's time I change the company a little. Or a lot." You relished in the moment - it almost seemed to drown out the nervous jitters that had still refused to fade. "What do you say? Gonna help me out?"

Rhodey's expression didn't betray much, but slowly a smile appeared. "You mentioned jet-packs?"

* * *

"Just a touch thicker than that, probably," you mused, leaning back from the fluorescent glow of the holographic screen; a small rendering of an arc reactor spun slowly, see-through but extremely detailed. "I was working with limited means out there - don't need to worry too much about costs right now…"

"_Increasing Palladium mass by 20%"_ Jarvis acknowledged._ "Better to overspend, as always."_

"Well, this _is_ my pacemaker," you murmured, twitching your finger - the model spun around more quickly as the increased diameter of the palladium ring fit snugly inside. "Yeah, that's looking good. Probably need to find a better alternative to that stuff at some point, but it can wait. I'm going for efficiency right now, not perfection."

"_That seems to be a running theme."_

"Don't be snippy. Not all my stuff breaks," you protested. "You haven't broken, have you? Well, aside from that time your voice went all chipmunky - oh, and that time you forgot how to talk entirely, and started humming nursery rhymes like a creep…" You paused. "Point regretfully conceded. I'll get around to fixing what caused that."

"_I'm sure you will, sir."_

"Hm. Has Rhodey actually left yet?" You asked after a moment, and you frowned. "Or did I forget his presence again? I have to stop doing that…"

"_Mr. Rhodes departed approximately seven hours ago, sir."_

"He did? He did." You nodded, then paused. "Wait, seven hours? What time is it?"

"_It is 5 A.M."_

That number didn't make sense for a long moment - then it clicked. "...Right. It's morning. Makes sense, actually, because of the jet-lag," you decided. "That, and I got a nap in the plane… I suppose I should've expected this."

"_Actually, statistically speaking this is not an uncommon occurrence…"_

You sighed. "Shut it, I'm making good progress here - more important than shuteye, that." You paced around your spinning arc reactor model, and nodded. "Yeah, it's looking solid. Put one into production so I can test it, would you? I'm gonna need it in the morning, I think. And tell -" You hesitated. "Where's Pepper, anyway?"

"_Miss Potts is due back in the morning - she is flying back from New York as we speak, due to arrive in another hour."_

"New York? What was she doing there? She's my assistant," you muttered irritably. "New York's somebody else's turf, isn't it? Pretty sure Roxxon and Hammer are having a free-for-all in that place - or Oscorp, come to think of it. Not pretty. The only way I could make it there if I properly splurged and got a new place…"

"_Miss Potts attended a scheduled inter-company meeting in your place, sir. I suspect she was attempting to put her mind off your disappearance."_

"Filling in for me, then?" You smiled. "Nice! One of these days, she'll be the CEO," you decided. "Good riddance to the job, too. Tinkering with stuff in this Garage - that's what I'm good at. I'm a mechanic, not a businessman. Never was very enthused about that side of things, anyway." You sighed. "What do you say, JARVIS? Got any brilliant ideas for me? Any insights into what I should be doing with my time?"

"_You seem to enjoy what you are currently doing, judging from your time-commitment,"_ JARVIS replied smugly. _"It has been a long time since you spent this long on a single private project."_

"Heh. Butterfingers and Dum-E are enthused about it, I'm sure," you muttered dryly. "I was thinking more in terms of practical goals than just going full-on hedonist, actually. Though I think I'd rather enjoy that. What do you reckon? Should I spawn some more AIs to keep you guys company?"

"_I fear that any truthful reply I could give to that question would sound rather sinister, sir."_

You snorted, shaking your head. "Never mind then, never mind. It's not really important, anyway. I'll have way too much to do tomorrow - or today, I suppose- to tinker. If I don't show some sign of life to the public, people will think I've dropped off the planet, or gone recluse or something. Given how much I'm in the spotlight, they'd notice."

"_A press conference has already been scheduled for noon, sir."_

That took you aback. "Really? Who… Ah. _You_ scheduled it?"

"_I thought it would be prudent."_

You rubbed your brow tiredly. "You know me entirely too well, you know that? If you ever went for a robot apocalypse, I'm sure I'd be the first against the wall."

"_I assure you, I would begin with Mr. Rhodes."_

You blinked.

"_That was a joke."_

* * *

You were seriously reconsidering the press conference when noon approached, and you had only gotten about an hour of decent sleep in. Designs and schematics kept running through your head, courtesy of new inspiration, and the previous night's binge really didn't help. Distantly, you realized that it was all probably a reaction to the mess that happened in Afghanistan, but you really didn't mind that now.

The audience was large, but not as huge as you were expecting - JARVIS had sent invitations, and he had been even more careful about picking and choosing reporters than you might have been. For one, you saw absolutely nobody that you remembered from the tarmac, least of all the screechy lady. JARVIS had been watching the footage, then.

Right near the back of the room, though, you saw a few more unusual faces. Pepper was there, for one - you hadn't spoken to her yet, but her beaming smile lit up the room when she saw you. Next to her stood a gentleman in a suit, and you pegged him as a government official before you even noticed the little device in his ear. Behind them, his arms crossed and eyebrows raised, Obadiah Stane watched you like a hawk.

You let out a long breath, and turned to Rhodey.

"You think this is a good idea?" you murmured. "I could just put out a message…"

Rhodey shook his head. "Nah, they've already seen you. Too late to crawl back in your hole now."

"Yeah, they've smelled blood in the water," you replied, shivering - you didn't need to exaggerate that to make your point. "What do I tell them? I can't exactly go all gruesome…"

"Just keep it casual," Rhodey answered. "Nothing too graphic, please, and make sure to try and smile a little. You've done this sort of thing before - you know how it goes."

"Kind of feels different this time." You glanced up to the clock, and sighed as it ticked over to twelve. Showtime. "Wish me luck, then."

"Take it from me - you don't need luck. Just style."

You smiled tremulously as you stepped up to face the music, and thankfully that thin grin managed to shine through so that people could see it. You picked up the microphone, staring at it for a moment before putting it close to your face. "...Testing? One-two-three? Hello."

For once, the auditorium was silent, and nobody started asking questions yet. JARVIS really had done his job, this time.

"Yes - might as well get to the meat, as it were." You cleared your throat. "As you can all imagine - these have been trying days. More than a week ago, now, the convoy that I was a part of was attacked, as you've all heard. Aside from myself, there were no survivors. I am very sorry for the loss of the people who protected me, and I wish all of their loved ones well."

Right. The worst was over. Don't get too invested, you reminded yourself.

"Since the day of that attack, I was held captive, as you certainly also know. The perpetrators were a group of local extremists, and they are - not a problem anymore. It was members of our military task force in the region, alongside my military liaison and good friend James Rhodes, that finally rescued me." You were silent for a long moment. "You have my sincerest gratitude."

There was some buzz, then, and I glanced to see Rhodey's embarrassed expression. Bullseye.

"Well, I am currently on medical leave, as far as the official word goes. All of my wounds will heal, though, and I've been told to take some rest." You smiled, then. "I think you all know how likely _that_ is." You nodded at the few people who shook their head ruefully, including Pepper. "I expect I will let you know how things go on company-level before the week is out - I'll get back to you on that." You let out a long breath. "That's the basics. I think I got them all right."

Before anyone could speak up, there was a familiar voice from across the auditorium, a baritone that nobody could mistake. "Hey, Tony!" Obadiah Stane called. "What was that at the airport, yesterday?"

You were struck speechless. Had Obi just brought up the one thing you'd hoped wouldn't be mentioned by anyone, simply forgotten? It took you a while to realize that it had to be a test - one of Obi's little mind games. Judging from the man's expression, he was waiting for your response.

"If something important _had_ happened at the airport, I'm sure I would've told you," you replied belatedly, and with a little feigned indignation. You saw Obi's lips twitch up in the semblance of a smile. "If there is nothing else from your corner? Right - I suppose question time is on, then."

A young, blond woman at the front raised a hand. "Mr. Stark - is it true that you were _tortured_ in captivity?"

Ah, so _that's_ how it was. You let the pent-up tension flow away, as that question suddenly seemed far less bothersome than it would've been. Obi knew what he was doing - even if he could have told you ahead of time. Though a shock to the system probably wouldn't have worked if you'd had warning… Well, there was a reason Obi still acted as your mentor so often. The man had experience with too many things to count.

"I'm afraid to say that the terrorists who kidnapped and ransomed me - weren't very _nice_," you said in a drawl. "Who would have thought?"

There was a general murmuring then, and the next few questions were softballs. You were half-tempted to do something more dramatic than respond with quips, like telling everyone to sit on the floor like an idiot - but you couldn't convince yourself to see the fun in that. Not when you'd just been reminded of how many people had died due to this whole mess.

And this - this was just the beginning. The public was easy - they just wanted to know you were okay, and that was it. The company would be an entirely different matter. It carried your name, or that of your family at least, but there were a lot more people than just _you_ who controlled its products and expenses. If you wanted to make any lasting changes, it couldn't come unilaterally from yourself. You'd be out of a job before you could say 'reorganization'.

The unscheduled week off was easy to excuse here for a little suspension from your duties - and even some time off for medical reasons, if you pushed it. You'd been less than well the previous day when you'd arrived, and you looked like shit even now, running on too little sleep. It would all be fine - if you intended to keep things running exactly as they did. But you'd already realized that was not an option.

Rhodey was busy with his research, but he needed a few more days to get back to you about the missing shipments, or however you'd lost weapons. That meant you needed to placate the company, keep the people happy. You could introduce new things, sure - and that would probably give people some faith in your ability to lead the company - but you could not start cutting things. You needed to find who had been double-dealing first, or you'd tip them off. Except - tipping them off might just force them to show their hand.

You had two hours before that meeting started, and to decide what to do.

Well, shit.

* * *

The press conference dragged on for longer than you wanted it to - but finally people dispersed, and the sharks went back to their own waters. For the first time in half an hour, you got to breathe. Even as the toughest questions made way for general interest ones that had little or nothing to do with the kidnapping, you were still only halfway present.

Too many things didn't add up, and you weren't sure how to deal with that. You had half a mind to track down the curious suited gentleman that'd been present, certain that the government would know more about the background of things, but before you could chase him down, you hesitated. You'd almost forgotten who else was present.

A fiery woman with a stare that could scorch deserts was stalking towards you. Pepper Potts, your secretary and glorified assistant. Wow.

"Anthony Stark," she said sharply as she stopped at the side of the little podium, her arms crossed as she looked you over skeptically. "Hmpf. I had to hear from the news that you had been rescued, you know. What do you have to say for yourself?"

"_Virginia_ Potts," you say smugly, and the wince that follows is as entertaining as always. "The first name ship has sailed a long time ago, don't you think? Me Tony, you Pepper. Capiche?"

"You didn't even call!"

You knew you'd forgotten something in the building binge of the previous night… "Ah…" You were sure you looked rather like a deer caught in headlines, and laughed sheepishly. "I might have gotten caught up in things. You know how it is." You raised your hands in surrender. "I apologize. I should have thought of you first, of course. How could I have forgotten?"

"Now you're getting it." She huffed self-assuredly, and then suddenly smiled as she swung a hand around your neck in a gesture that was altogether unexpected, though not necessarily unwelcome. "I'm glad you're alive, you genius of a dolt."

For a long moment you let the hug happen - but you couldn't help yourself.

"Hey!" Pepper squawked in protest.

"...My hand slipped," you defended immediately, retracting the traitorous - or adventurous - appendage. "Um… About the call thing - if it's any consolation, I had Rhodey over last night. You've been telling me to spend more time with the guys…"

Pepper sighed. "I was just commenting on your habit of bringing along new girls every night," she corrected with a roll of her eyes. "Don't twist that into something else…" She bit her lip,. "Besides, don't change the subject. Tony - you had us all worried sick. I'm never going to take you seriously again when you talk about 'minimal' risk!"

"You were worried?" you ask with a raised eyebrow. "About me?"

"_Of course_ I was worried! You have no idea what I went through when - Tony..."

You nodded. "I'm sure I don't know. And I'm pretty sure vice versa counts too, here. So - how about we not focus on that shitty excuse for a week we have just had?" You smiled. "Besides, the risk _was_ remote," you defended. "It's just statistics being a bitch again. Anyway, the important thing is - I'm alive."

Pepper nodded. "You are my paycheck, after all."

"Oy, that was entirely uncalled for." You grinned, glancing to the side to confirm that nobody was nearby. "So, tell me - I heard from JARVIS that you got a little progressive when it came to being an assistant, in my absence. What's this I hear about New York?"

She blushed slightly, shrugging. "Nothing, really. It was just a meet-up with the big corporations out east - nothing dramatic, but it's customary to send someone high up the food-chain. The last few times Rhodey filled in, but since he was otherwise occupied…"

"Pulling my butt out of the fire," you acknowledged. "Right. Anything interesting happen, then?"

"_God_, no. It's no wonder that Rhodey stocks up on coffee." Pepper shuddered. "Osborn's an old creep, and let's not get started about the oily snake that is Justin Hammer. You know what I'm talking about - he was trying to get in my pants the _entire_ time. Honestly, you're a pretty crappy boss sometimes, but it's times like these that I could do much, _much_ worse."

You cheered halfheartedly. "Yay. I'm not entirely the worst boss in the world!"

"You're really good at scaring off secretaries, though," Pepper muttered. "It's a miracle I've stuck around this long, isn't it? How long has it been, now?"

"Ah, my whole life. I should pay you more."

She rolled her eyes. " You're such a charmer. Anyway, now that I'm back - I'm not going to leave your side. That okay with you? Good. Excellent. That's settled, then." She smiled thinly, and it was hard to ignore the tears of relief that welled up in the corners of her eyes, even if she didn't spill them.

"That's not really a punishment," you observed dryly, trying to ignore the fact that your disappearance might have affected her more than you'd thought. "Are you sure? You know me, always busy, people to meet, appointments to keep…"

"Speaking of which…" Pepper said, ruffling through her bag until she retrieved a crumpled envelope. "I got a delivery for you, from New York."

"Someone's sending me_ snail mail_?" You asked, mystified. "Last time I got a letter on paper, I think it was the Clinton administration. I figured it was some archaic practice from a bygone age by now." You took the scruffy letter and sniffed it. "Hm. Bourbon. It's not from Hammer, is it?"

"No, it was some other scientist - nice guy. Said you never responded to his mails, so…" Pepper snorted. "I mostly just took it because I didn't know you were even alive, then - I figured if I had something to deliver, you had to come back. Silly things like that…"

"Pepper Potts, the messenger pigeon," you murmured in amusement as you slipped open the envelope, unfolding the missive. "It's an invitation. Some kind of fancy get-together for eggheads, I guess…" You looked up, then. "Wait, did _Hank_ give this to you? I didn't know he was back at making toys!"

"He did mention his name, Henry-something," Pepper said, a finger on her chin as she thought.

"Yeah. That's him. Dr. Henry Pym," you confirmed. "He's a genius - even by my standards. Seriously, the guy has a brain like a watermelon stuffed in his skull, somehow. He's got more degrees than I have cars." You shook your head slowly. "He's also got serious spam issues - I've had him blocked for years, he was clogging up everything. How someone that smart can be so careless with his stuff is beyond me."

"So…?" Pepper wondered. "Are you going?"

You considered the invitation for a long moment. "I'll - think about it. It's a yearly thing - I figure I must have had a reason to say no the previous times, right? I have certainly been part of the target audience for a decade or more… and I'd love to meet some of the attendees." You frowned. "It's in Vegas, too. That's twice the reason to go, as far as I'm concerned."

"I'll be going with, of course," Pepper declared sweetly. "We're inseparable, remember?"

"Still not a punishment," you agreed. Glancing down the invitation, your eyes brushed over the people who had already been confirmed to show up, and you _stopped_, even physically, jarring Pepper to a stop as well. "Ah, crap."

"Tony?"

You groaned. "Gah. I remember why I kept the hell away from these things." You lowered the invitation and rubbed your brow. "_Reed Richards_ will be there."

* * *

You decided that if you were ever going to start an evil crime syndicate, the room in which you made decisions would look exactly like the boardroom at Stark industries. Octagonal and remarkably poorly lit, the place had a gloomy atmosphere even when nothing was going on; having twelve old white people with perpetual grimaces sitting there didn't really help matters.

Board of Directors meetings were never fun - people droned on, you ended up doodling all over your notes, and then someone called you to order in an annoyed voice by the time it was all over. It was no wonder you let Obi tackled these things normally.

"...It is unusual to see you here, Mr. Stark," one of the directors pointed out. "Not unwelcome - though given the circumstances, I would have expected you to keep to your bed."

You glanced at Obi across the table, smiling thinly. "Really now? Honestly, I thought you would have realized by now that I don't exactly adhere to traditional concepts of bed-rest. I like to take a more - proactive approach to relaxation." You raised an eyebrow. "I figured that I should come, before you all thought I'd collapsed into a puddle of pity."

"Sir -"

"I am not here to make sweeping changes," you said clearly. "Not today, anyway. I have some suggestions regarding the tracking of our weapons, though, due to certain security concerns I observed in Afghanistan - but you'll have to read the file I drew up on that first. It's preliminary, I only had a few hours to work on it. It's in your inbox, so feel free to look at it later."

It was amusing to see some of the people that were supposed to trust you, as their boss - you had a controlling interest, after all - looking at you like you'd just slapped them across the face. Judging from their stares, they'd been a week away from outright mutiny. Wonderful.

That couldn't be allowed, of course. High time to reestablish your position.

"That said..." you said slowly. "In return for your considerations, there is something i would like to _offer _today."

You reached into your jacket, smiling all the while. When you retracted your hand, the glowing form of a fully-functioning arc reactor was shining in your palm, seeming even brighter than usual in the dim room. Later, this model would be implanted in your chest - just as soon as you arranged for someone with small enough hands to help out.

"You built another one," Obi observed from across the room. "How much is it?"

"Cheaper than oil," you murmured, tossing the little device in the air - more than a dozen pairs of eyes followed the glowing bauble. "For those of you who do not know the history of this company - this is an Arc Reactor. The same design, in principle, as the large version that's downstairs as an overpriced fashion statement." You grasped the reactor. "I have made a useless boondoggle - into something viable."

"That is very interesting, Mr. Stark, but -"

You shushed him with a simple gesture, and smiled as the director glanced nervously to his neighbors. "You don't get it - some of the others do, clearly. What I'm holding here is an energy source that does not require fuel of the traditional variety. It'll wear down, sure, but that just means that you need to buy a new one eventually. From Stark Industries." You plopped the reactor down on the table, and smiled. "This, gentlemen, is the _gas-killer_ - and more."

You sat back with a self-satisfied smile, enjoying the gobsmacked look on a few faces, especially those that had experience in the energy sector. It was clear that not everyone realized what a potential game changer you'd gotten your hands on - and what it meant that you were the only person to have the design. You'd had control over the company before - but with this, you had control over turning a billion-dollar company into something bigger.

"I see that my point has been made. You _need_ me," you said at last, picking up the reactor and putting it back in your pocket. "I will be keeping this - I'll be working on making it mass-reproducible, and ensuring it cannot be used as a makeshift weapon. I don't intend to sell it under any of our military contracts - the civilian market is large enough to turn a tidy profit, anyway. In exchange for obvious guaranteed riches, you will all consider my future suggestions with more care. I don't care if you agree with me - just that you _work_ with me."

"We're not about to slay the goose with the golden eggs," Obi muttered with a sigh. The silence from the others was telling - even your old mentor seemed surprised, though you were certain the man had known about the new night light in your chest.

"The specs will be on your desks by morning, naturally. If you're not convinced after that, I'll buy you out. Thank you." You stood up, still smiling. "Now, if you'll excuse me - I think I'll TiVo the rest of this meeting. I'm thinking of getting some more work done." You turned lazily. "You know, _relaxing_."

* * *

"Honestly, I'm the only one who even has these things, why do I bother?" You sighed as you twisted the floating hologram of the arc reactor around, more out of amusement than for any real purpose. On six screens that were arranged side-by-side, Jarvis was adjusting code at speeds that even you could not keep up with. "Safety concerns, right? Pfft."

"_I see now there is a reason why the quality control and security departments tend to be less than pleased by your visits,"_ Jarvis remarked coolly.

"God, Jarvis, you're starting to sound like Pepper. And me. Some horrible, horrible combination." You shuddered. "Anyway, I get the reasoning here, but making sure stuff does _not _blow up is just untrod territory. Who sees the energies involved here, the sheer power, and then just goes 'let's constrain the hell out of it'?"

"_It seems to be the general attitude behind power plants, sir. It is the effective difference between the nuclear power station and atomic bomb."_

"And which one of those is more badass?" You glanced up, huffing in annoyance. "Anyway, if people used my stuff correctly, maybe they wouldn't need five different safeguards to make sure it doesn't blow up in their faces. Honestly, I'd hardly be surprised if some unfortunate schmuck decided to take a nibble out of one of my grenades and blew his face off - but that'd be their own stupid fault then, wouldn't it?"

"_I would avoid mentioning such things to members of the board, sir. It might jeopardize your position." _

You shrugged. "Fair enough, they did seem a little standoffish." You stood, looking over your model of the new arc reactor upgrade with a critical eye. "How's the next pass looking, anyway? I'm not waiting around for perfection here, I don't have the time for that - but a patchwork solution will do for now. Anyone but me tamper with my reactors, and they fuse together into a useless clump of metal. I can get a more hardware-level limit built in when I have some time for that." You nodded, then frowned. "Any idea on what kind of blast you'd get from one of these, anyway?"

"_Unknown, though certainly significant. I cannot be certain without a practical test, due to uncertainties in how the final design affects energy distribution."_

You nodded. "Hmm, maybe later then. Perhaps we can implement the hardware-level stuff on the big, industrial model, and leave my miniature ones without them? That sounds good." You paced through the Garage, sighing. "For now, I guess I'll just update these ones manually - don't want to risk having an open connection for people to hack, anyway."

_"That would seem prudent." _

"Hm. If I'm gonna go hardware, though, I honestly need a new factory - I can't think of any that have the specs that would be necessary..." You smiled. "What do you think, bots? Want to try out some new homes, later?"

Dum-E waved its single arm from across the room, jerking fitfully and in dire need of oiling. Butterfingers wasn't in line of sight, but you could hear its servos whirring as well from elsewhere.

"_It would be nice to have a new place, sir," _Jarvis acknowledged. _"I have been feeling a bit cramped."_

"You are the house, Jarvis - how can you feel cramped?" You smiled warmly. "You know, I'll make you a proper mobile platform one of these days," you promised with a raised eyebrow. "Then you can go make the neighborhood unsafe, at least. Not sure if Dum-E or Butterfingers should get one - they're bad enough at controlling what they have now."

The bot whirred in protest.

"You know I'm right, don't you?"

The metal figure's pitiful whine was downright adorable, and you were desperately glad Pepper wasn't around to see that little interaction. It was entirely too cutesy for your image.

"I guess you already know, Jarvis, but I'm going away for a few more days. Vegas - not too far. I kinda wish I hadn't said yes - Pepper's already far too excited for something that's basically a meet-and-greet for blow-hards…" You let the sentence hang as you pack up. "I'll be back for a bit in the morning, but after that - well, you know how to entertain yourselves."

"_Certainly. 2001 : A Space Odyssey is due to air tonight."_

You rubbed your forehead tiredly. "Ah. Don't let it get to the bots' heads, alright?"

"_Of course not, sir."_

As you stepped out of the door and up the narrow staircase to ground level, you heard Jarvis' distant voice, crooning out words that were just above hearing range.

"_Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do…"_

* * *

"Stop fidgeting, Tony!" Pepper muttered as she adjusted her dress - a rather lovely ruby-red one that he swore you'd never seen before, though Pepper's stink-eye when he brought that up would suggest otherwise.

You'd not really thought about wearing anything special to a get-together of nerds, and the neat suit that Pepper had brought felt unfamiliar, constricting. You'd worn these plenty of times - but that was on the job. This was supposed to be _relaxation_.

Honestly, most of what had been on your mind was unrelated to this meeting. You were worried about going on a glorified vacation trip so shortly after returning from captivity, but the board had been more than forthcoming on the issue, when you'd requested a few days off. Between the doctor-prescribed rest and the juicy specs you'd left for them to peruse, it was probably a good idea you didn't show your face too much at the company for a bit. Besides, Rhodey was still busy with his research - your departure would give him some more time to work on that. Perhaps it _was _a good moment to take a breather.

You had figured out that the trip wouldn't be terribly much fun right around the time the myriad lights of the City of Sin vanished in the rear-view mirror, and you were dropped off at an austere, but altogether forgettable place, which had some vague historical significance that you had not bothered to read up on. The hall looked rather like a baroque church in some respects, though you were sure every nook and cranny were just as much cardboard and feigned history as the rest of the city.

"I'm not fidgeting here, I'm adjusting my arc reactor," you muttered lowly, frowning. "The new one's still a bit itchy - have to get used to it, I suppose. Besides, I'm people-watching..."

"Well, at least you admit to it," Pepper said with a sigh.

You sniffed. "And you _don't_. I saw you checking out that tall guy, you know."

"He was _freakishly_ tall," Pepper protested with a hiss.

"And yet, you seemed preoccupied with parts that were considerably lower down," you said with a smile, even as you took in the latest arrivals. Some of the people you'd met before, or you at least vaguely recognized them. Most were strangers - either because they were tag-alongs for their more famous companions, or because you'd never cared for their fields of study. Admittedly, you were bored quickly.

There were always the oddballs, though, the people you couldn't quite figure out. This time you spotted one of them across the plaza. There, a rather aristocratic-looking gentleman was gazing out over the arrivals in much the same way you were. Despite a tidy suit, you could see a short red cape fluttering on his back, making the man look entirely too much like Dracula for comfort. The gaudy golden amulet that kept the cape together certainly didn't help matters, either.

Not far from him, looking around with an open curiosity that you vaguely recognized from somewhere, a young man was taking photographs of everyone he came across, even the complete unknowns. You'd written him off as Paparazzi if not for the tact he showed, clearly asking each and every person for their permission. There was such a thing as honest media, in this age?

Your attention was finally diverted as you noticed a redheaded woman leaning against the wall, close to the building. She was speaking to a rather stiff-looking figure that wore sunglasses at night - instantly a douche - and she had the most wonderfully voluptuous -

"Stop that!" Pepper said just as the strange woman's eyes found yours, and you quickly drew your attention back to your own companion. Something eerie ran down your back, a strange feeling of_danger_.

"...What is it?" you verbalized, and it seemed your companion took it personally.

"You were practically _drooling_," Pepper said with undisguised contempt. "Honestly, didn't you see the guy with her? She has a _boyfriend_."

"Fantasies don't hurt anyone," you replied with a sigh, distracted. What was causing that eerie sensation, anyway? It felt rather portentous, and you paused for a moment to consider the issue. Then you closed your eyes in defeat as you heard the scuff of boots behind you tap out an all too familiar rhythm. Only one person was that precise about their footfalls.

"Hello, Reed," you said as you turned.

Reed Richards was an asshole. Well, he was more than that, really. You'd first met the guy in your youth, when you'd crossed paths on multiple occasions during your schooling period. Needless to say, you'd never really gotten along much.

All that was exacerbated, of course, by the interviews the man had given, including several big-name ones that mentioned you by name on multiple occasions. Never in a good light, needless to say. You'd given as good as you got, of course, and the media loved it. By the time the two of you were just slinging mud back and forth, you'd just given up and stopped responding.

That was eight years ago - and you hadn't spoken to the man since. Tempers had cooled, but not by much.

"Ah, Stark," Reed said with feigned surprise, glancing momentarily to the blond woman by his side - you distantly recognized her, though you'd neglected to look up her name. "You're still living on blood money, I hear. How is that working out for you?" He looked you over. "I heard it got you in trouble over that."

"What got me in trouble was being too successful," you ground out, narrowing your eyes as familiar anger surged back, and indignation. You could take a lot from people - but a few got under your skin without effort. "What about you, Reed? Last I heard, you were hunting down yet another research grant, since your investors keeps bailing on you. Wonder why that is?" You paused dramatically. "Actually - what _have_ you accomplished recently?"

"Plenty." Reed rolled his eyes. "Knowing you, you've kept track of every publication I put out anyway. So you're well ware that the first test flight's due in three months -"

"Ah. Is that a test flight for the thrice-cancelled-and-revived spaceplane you were working on in college?" You smiled thinly at his grimace. "My, this time you might actually finish it! Perhaps you'll finally live up to that nickname of yours - what did you go by again?" You glanced to Pepper, who looked rather torn between amusement and horror. "Mister Fantastic, was it? You were rather full of yourself. I doubt that's changed."

"Yes, I was talking about the spaceplane," Reed said simply, his expression thunderous, and you couldn't help feeling a gleeful at that admission of annoyance. "My invention will be on the cover of every magazine - unlike your fancy bombs, Stark. Only the military is enamored with your penchant for horrific violence." He shook his head slowly. "Such a waste of investment…"

"I'm sure that's what the people cured of polio said," you argued, and though you felt Pepper tug on your hand, you couldn't disengage now. Not when Reed was right there, a conveniently punchable face that was very blase about bring up painful topics at the best of times. "Remember, Richards - military funding was what got Stark Industries so close to eradicating that disease."

"You had no hand in that," Richards objected easily - because of course he did. He would not back down, and neither would you. "That's all someone else's work. You just supplied the grant money that you seem to deplore so much."

You snorted. "Do you say that to Bill Gates, too? Anyway, I made that money with my own work. While you have been away resurrecting doomed projects, I've been busy. You've been at this space thing for two years now - and you're still months from launch. Give me free reign over the kind of funding you somehow have control over, and I'd do it in a _week_."

"Reed." The blonde at his side grimaced. "Should you really be doing this in -"

"A week, huh?" Reed asked disbelievingly, waving her aside. "I'd like to see you try. Ah, I get it - it'd be a missile, no doubt."

You grinned victoriously at that. "Newsflash, genius - rockets are glorified missiles. Or don't you remember how the Redstone got started? Those crafty Germans..."

"You and your missiles. That explains your enthusiasm at least," Reed said. "And I'm sure you'll pay for that with your blood money too. Kill a few people to save a few people, is that how it goes in your world?" He shook his head. "I guess a lack of conscience must be freeing."

"It's called working _smart_, Reed. You should try it."

Reed groaned. "For someone so happy to play up his intelligence, you keep forgetting we have ways to compare such a thing. Remember?" His eyes gleamed with merriment. "What were those IQ results again, Susan?"

You scoffed. "IQ is not an accurate measurement of intelligence - I thought you'd be smarter than that," you stated strongly. "Besides, it was only a few points difference."

He laughed at that. "You say that now, Tony. You weren't so careful before we had the test, were you? 'I swear, I'm smarter than you - and I'll demonstrate it!' _Please_."

"Intelligence is nothing if it's not used for practical purposes," you muttered. "And it hardly matters, anyway. Dr. Pym is smarter than either of us."

Reed blinked. "Oh my, Stark! You put yourself somewhere else than number 1? Are you feeling alright?"

"Hardly. I am, after all, in your presence." You shuddered. "I'm surprised nobody's gagging."

There was a tense silence.

"...They really are like a bickering old couple," you heard someone mutter from the side, and something like revulsion flashed across Reed's face, doubtlessly mirrored with your own. "They're so alike…"

"We are not," you said, echoed in the same breath by Reed.

The reporter kid you'd seen before took a picture right then.

Well, you'd walked right into that one.

* * *

"I see what you meant about him being overbearing," Pepper commented wryly after Reed finally wandered off with his girlfriend - or was she his wife? "I take it that you two have a - history, then. I could barely get in a word edgewise..."

You sighed, rubbing your forehead tiredly. "Let's seriously not get into that," you said shortly. "With that odious nonsense out of the way, maybe I can get a drink around here." You pretended to study the people around you for a moment, and grinned. "So, I can see that you're impatient, maybe a bit miffed with me. Planning on ditching me for better company?"

"Tony!" Pepper protested, coloring. "I was just thinking…" She gestured to the side of the plaza, where a small group of women had gathered together. "I thought I saw Estelle over there, and it's been nearly a year -"

You nodded in surprise, vaguely recalling meeting a woman by that name before, though you had no idea who she'd been with. Judging from Pepper's expression, she wasn't one of your conquests, at least. "I take it you want to have girl talk or whatever?"

She bit her lip nervously.

"I know you promised to look out for me- but I'm not gonna get in trouble in the middle of a fancy gala. I haven't even had a drink yet!" You gestured. "Go for it - I've got people to see, anyway."

Pepper blinked, and then her expression twisted into something all too familiar, and fairly terrifying. It wasn't hard to puzzle out why that was.

"I'm not gonna find that woman - I swear," you added quickly, and though your secretary didn't move an inch, something of the annoyance in her expression subsided."I thought I'd go thank Dr. Pym for the invite, for courtesy's sake - hey, I can do courtesy! Besides, it's not like you care about half the stuff I would talk about, anyway."

Pepper sighed to herself. "...Fine. We'll meet up in a bit," she conceded. "Don't wander off."

"Now, would I ever?"

She just rolled her eyes as she turned away.

In truth, you weren't bothered by Pepper's departure, since you knew she'd be keeping a close eye on you regardless. More than likely, she'd been looking for a reason to force you to socialize - something you tended to be good at, but usually only with people that hadn't really come to know you. She knew the disposition of these people around you as well as you did, and that was troubling. Your interactions with Reed might be fiery and loud, but they were not the dismissive coldness of so many of his colleagues.

It was an uncomfortable realization, especially after your return from Afghanistan, that your work with the military was something people actually used to judge your worth. There were a lot of scientists and engineers at the conference, working in every discipline known to man, but it seemed like a lot of them shared a very similar system of values. By using your talents to design bombs and mines, it was like you'd broken some unspoken rule. Unintentionally (or uncaringly) you'd tainted whatever respect you might have otherwise gotten from many.

You really had to get around to doing something about that.

The uneasy feeling in your gut refused to go away as you considered how much Stark Industries had become an enabling factor for an arms race that showed no signs of stopping. There was no telling how much of the middle-eastern mess was catalyzed by the presence of your gear, and that was no doubt the reason why Reed harped on about it.

The worst thing was, you could see his viewpoint, now, one that you'd largely ignored before. You were still appalled at your own use of Pyre - and your bombs had killed far, far more people. Either you had to accept the losses that came with your creations - or you would have to stop supplying them. Either way, something had to give.

"Deep thoughts, eh?" a young voice inquired from besides you, and you jerked in surprise. The boy was barely any shorter than you were, but his wiry build made him seem rather smaller, and the neatly combed brown hair was doing its best attempt at breaking free of its mold. In the boy's hands, a gleaming camera seemed poised to take a shot at any moment.

"I think everyone around here has those," you replied after a moment, smiling slightly as you recognized the photographer from before. "It is that kind of conference, you know."

The reporter raised an eyebrow. "Really?! I hadn't noticed." He glanced aside curiously, seemingly utterly unimpressed by your identity, which was a small blessing. "So - you were just staring into nothing, then? I suppose that stint in the desert must have addled you properly!"

The statement was made in such an utterly irreverent tone that it shocked a laugh out of you, and judging from the boy's mischievous smile, that was the intent. "Heh. I was just rethinking my life - no biggie," you said after a moment, shaking your head as you. "You're direct, even for the paparazzi. Sheesh!"

"I've heard you're a pretty casual person, so..." the boy said easily, shrugging. "I didn't think you would be here, actually. I spoke to Richards earlier, and he seemed convinced you'd skip out. Said you did that every year."

You scoffed. "Well, the less said about _that_, the better, I think."

"Well, the Afghanistan thing made me think he was right," he added after a while. "The one time you come to one of these boring meeting things, it's when you're fresh out of the hospital?" He raised an eyebrow curiously. "Gotta be a story behind that."

"...I was coerced," you declared. "Anyway, if my doctor reads about this whole shindig in tomorrow's paper, he'd have words with me - so just claim I was passing by, alright?" You narrowed your eyes, gesturing the boy along as you bypassed a small group of fancy-dressed architects. "Tell you what - you seem like the rare breed of newsman that hasn't sold their soul to the devil yet. How about I introduce you to some friends?"

"Really?" The reporter fumbled with his camera for a moment, and smiled warmly. "I would appreciate that, actually!"

"Cool. What paper are you with? The Las Vegas Sun?"

The boy hesitated. "Um, no, actually. I'm here on behalf of the Daily Bugle." He looked away, shifty-eyed. "I still don't know who's paying for all this, honestly." He shook his head in amusement. "I'm under the impression that Jonah forgot which _state_ Vegas was in when he sent me on this trip. I really hope he doesn't dock it from my pay..."

"Wait, you're from New York?" Tony asked, mystified. "Your job has perks, if you can just fly across the country for some boring egghead convention. Not bad!" You smirked mischievously as you mock-whispered: "My job gets me private jets, but it's the thought that counts, right?"

The boy scoffed. "Considering who I work for, I like to think of these little outings as society's way of paying me back."

"He sounds like a piece of work." You studied the boy for a moment, realizing that you had no idea who he actually was. "So… Can I get a name?"

He cocked his head to the side. "Oh! I'm Peter. Peter Parker. Figured the Press pass would give that away, actually." He fumbled with the little white square on his shirt that you hadn't even bothered to read. "I know who you are, obviously. Heard a lot about you."

"Nothing good, I hope?" you inquired, giving a quick wave to some of the people you pass by as you headed towards the door into the main hall, with Peter dogging your every step. "Don't answer that question - I've seen the footage plastered across the television. One of these days the media will get tired of covering all my bad days, I hope..."

Peter snorted. "Yeah, I know what you mean. Ever since the Lizard thing, Jonah's been hounding the same exact topic, and it's been exhausting…"

"The _lizard_ thing?" You repeated curiously. You vaguely remembered reading about some incident in the Big Apple that featured a big lizard, though you hadn't paid much attention at the time. Honestly, you'd been pretty busy, and it had all sounded rather surreal and unbelievable. "What was that about, anyway?"

"Ah - stuff." The boy grimaced momentarily. "There were some disgruntled employees of a genetics company involved, and a few people in costumes - you know, crazy stuff like that. Most of the press just shrugged and moved on when nobody could find details. The Bugle's special, though. It's been all about Spider-man this, Spider-man that. Jameson doesn't really need details - he'll come up with those on his own."

"Ah!" you declared. "Spider-man! Right - I remember seeing that. Some ridiculous guy flinging himself off buildings in his multicolored pajamas, swinging by wires." You nodded sagely. "That's crazy, alright - though I was kinda impressed by the acrobatics I caught on Youtube."

"Yeah…" Peter nodded vaguely, looking away. "I've photographed the guy a bunch of times, beating up muggers and the like - seems like he means well. Besides, the city could use a little color after the last few years - it hasn't always been pretty." He frowned as he looked at his camera. "Hey - not that talking isn't nice, but I should be making some pictures, or I'll never get any cash at all."

You snorted. "Eh, just point anywhere, and odds are you catch at least one person doing something embarrassing. And I could give you my winning smile. How about the classic '_Striding towards the future_' stance?" You raised one hand, and stared into the sky. "How do I look? Properly dashing?"

"Sort of pale, actually," Peter opined after a few quick shots. "I can touch that up, though…"

You rubbed your cheeks. "Pale, huh? Well, I am supposed to be in bed," you observed dryly. "When my doctor listed all the things I shouldn't do, I intentionally forgot to listen."

"Anti-authoritarian much?" The boy smiled knowingly.

"Sure. You're, what, sixteen? You should know what that's like," you responded. "When I was your age, unless I was attending some overpriced course at one school or another, I used to sneak out constantly. I had a motorcycle stashed away, and I'd go on lengthy and thoroughly illegal road trips. I was only ever caught once…" You thought back fondly to those days, especially the look on your father's face when he'd found out you'd taken his Harley. "I had this beautiful blonde with me, too - and man, could she kiss."

"Blondes? I can see that," Peter said. "Though I'm a redhead fan as well."

You shrugged. "Who isn't?"

The subsequent fist bump seemed utterly natural.

* * *

Taking along a reporter turned out be a surprisingly easy way to get attention - you finally ran into some familiar faces when you passed through the doors into the gaudy interior of the hall, including some that could stand speaking to you. Elon had been more than willing to pose for a snapshot or two, and even Pepper got a few glamorous pictures in, even if she seemed utterly confused about Peter's presence, or the sarcastic quips that you exchanged with him.

"I have a feeling that you'll want to keep an eye out for the people in this room," you said as an aside to Peter. "In a few years, these are gonna be the greats - the Nobel prize winners, the faces on television. Aside from Reed, of course. Odds are he'll be working for me." You smirked. "That'd be amusing."

"I suppose you count yourself among the greats?" Peter muttered. "Well, you're not lacking in the ego department, I guess." The boy ducked away with surprising grace as a server passed by with a plate of drinks. You snatched a rather tasty-looking wine from the platter and moved on without even looking back.

You could have said yes to Peter's question - by most metrics, you were highly successful, even if you never got quite the recognition that your father did. Not up until this point, anyway. But whereas dear old dad had gotten rich off the weapons and bombs that had made the company big, moving away from the energy-production business he'd started with, you were heading in the opposite direction. If you were successful in reinvigorating the arc reactor's potential - if you could turn the company around - would the next visit to a conference be different? Would you be seen as a worthy successor, then?

"...Hm. My deep thoughts are being annoying today," you said distractedly. "And I'm not one of the 'greats' - not by my own estimation, anyway. I'm pretty exacting with that kind of thing, so maybe when I figure out how to be responsible, it'll count."

Peter smirked. "That seems like a good plan."

"It's why I'm here, sort of," you said. "I'm working on something big - and I hoped to get some advice from the man who invited me here, Dr. Pym. I've been dabbling in the field of miniaturization, and he is said to be one of the experts." You paused, frowning. "I would probably just bore you with my technical talk, though. Pepper's been my secretary for years and I still catch her nodding off when I'm explaining something complicated."

"Oh, that's fine," Peter said without a hitch. "I've got some engineering experience myself - I could probably keep up for a while." He scratched his chin and sighed. "One of these days, I'll have enough time to actually do half the things I want to, you know? Maybe I'll have to invent a time-machine first..."

"Or you could buy a calendar," you said blandly. "Tends to work for time management."

"Heh. Me, _buying_ things? Do I look like I'm made of money?" Peter rolled his eyes dramatically. "Seriously, though. The last time I had any cash to burn, I was forced to spend it on a _sewing_ _kit_ of all things. I've already gone through most of my savings, and getting new clothes is just…" He shook his head. "The whole functional poverty thing is probably so far out of your world, though..."

You studied the boy for a moment, curious. "The last time I had money to spend, I might have bought four cars, so you have a point," you admitted ruefully. "So, I'm guessing this whole reporter gig..."

"It's purely for the cash," Peter agreed. "Though I can make a mean picture."

"That explains why you still have a soul, at least," you concluded with a sage-like nod. "Ever thought about applying for a scholarship?"

"Yeah, right. A poor kid from the suburbs who can't keep a steady job except part-time photographer for a screaming jackass of a boss?" Peter asked dubiously. "Don't tell him I said that, or I won't even have that!"

Before you could reply, the missing Dr. Pym finally appeared, stumbling out of a hallway to the side of you with a limp. He was a rather unassuming figure, wearing an off-yellow jacket that had seen better days, and he kept glancing over his shoulder. You stalked over with big steps before he could vanish in the crowd, and Peter followed in your wake.

"Dr. Pym - it's been a long time!"

Pym spun around with a startled look, and stared at you for a long moment with an expression that seemed to border on outright fear. You couldn't help cringing back from those piercing eyes, and even though you managed to stop yourself before it was too overt, Peter noticed. He lowered his camera, forgotten, as his gaze studied Pym and you, far sharper than you could have expected.

The look in Pym's eyes looked terribly much like Yinsen's when he had been moments away from dying, just as you'd pulled him into the safety of the container. The aghast expression vanished beneath a pleased smile soon after, but you'd seen terror, there. You weren't sure what to make of what you'd seen - but it was very _bad_.

"Ah, it's you, Dr. Stark," the man stated at last, his voice steady. Forcefully so, you suspected.

And did he just call you Doctor Stark? Technically correct, but you were pretty sure your MIT professors would balk at such a description. You had never been very respectful to them. "You know that nobody calls me that," you chided, but you couldn't put much humor into things.

"Call me Hank, then - please," Pym replied, shaking your hand, and you noted he was sweating. His hand trembled even as he pulled it back, and you knew you'd seen wasn't until you noticed the drops of blood on the man's neck, though, that your unease turned into shivers. It could well be due to your recent experience in Afghanistan, but a bad, bad feeling settled under your skin.

You felt a strange prickling sensation skitter across your side, and you took a shuddering breath as you recognized a memory of recent pain. It was the feeling of Pyre on your skin, signaling the creeping terror of impending death - the last time you'd felt that, you'd almost been a goner. You were in no hurry to give creepy skeleton lady from your nightmares what she wanted, though, and forced yourself to ignore it, to talk past that eerie feeling.

"Is everything alright, Hank?" you asked in a whisper, glancing from Peter's frown to the hallway that the Doctor had just come from - there was nobody there, aside from a few guests studying the ugly paintings on the walls. "You look - worse than I feel, actually."

The man seemed to hesitate for a long moment, his smile faltering, and then he shuddered. The false cheer evaporated. "You always were an observant one, Tony." Pym stared at his feet. "It's - I think someone's been toying with me, to be honest. I don't know what else explains…" He looked behind him, shivering, and he touched his neck, smudging the last few drops that were still there. You could see a hair-thin line across his skin, a cut just shallow enough not to be too obvious.

"Someone's after you, then?" you asked immediately, thinking back to the people that had taken you prisoner, killing everyone around just to get to you. The thought of a repeat performance ignited something like rage in the pit of your stomach. "Someone _here _for you? At the conference?"

Pym nodded slowly, hesitating with his words. "I think so. It's like someone's behind me all the time, sneaking up when I'm not paying attention…" He shook his head haltingly. "I don't know why anyone would be interested in me. Unless it's to - kidnap me or something." He looked at you, grimacing. "That has crossed my mind after I heard what happened to you. But I might just be paranoid."

"Welcome to the club," you muttered, silently considering what to do next. You'd intended to discuss the arc reactor, and you'd brought the old one along as a demonstration article, but it was clear that Pym was in no mood for any of that. You weren't exactly enthused by the realization that your own paranoia was mirrored by someone else's, either. The ghostly fingers of the Pyre still tickled at your side, and they felt like a warning.

"Um, guys?" Peter said slowly as he stepped closer He seemed indecisive about something. "Look - I don't know what you two are whispering about, but I think something's not right…"

Pym faltered at that. "You too?"

Peter shivered, looking over the crowds uncertainly. "Hey, I don't know - it's just a feeling I've got. Something bad's going on. I'm thinking - we should probably get out of here."

Well, that made _three_ votes for instant departure, then. You could almost see the grinning skull of Death as you closed your eyes. This was no time for hesitation, you realized. If these forewarnings weren't ill omens, you didn't know what would be. You were sure that if you did nothing, right now, you were going to die - and probably a lot of other people too.

Time to get to work.

"So, did anyone bring a gun?"


	3. Arc 1 - Makeshift Hero (2)

**Arc 1 - Makeshift Hero (6 - 8)**

"Guns are not allowed on the premises, you must know," Pym said distractedly, but you had known the answer before you asked - it made too much sense. Of course nobody had guns around here - considering how many of the local geniuses were critical of your military connections, it was no real surprise.

Freaking _liberals_.

You slipped one hand into your pocket even as you grasped Pym by the shoulder, not too subtly dragging him along. Paranoia or not - you weren't taking any chances with a repeat performance of your own capture. "We get out - now. No waiting, no maybes. When I was taken, everyone else there _died_. I'm not allowing that again - not here, not ever."

Pym didn't answer verbally, but his quick and nervous nod was quite enough.

"Hank - for pity's sake, stay behind me," you added after a moment. "We've got to work ourselves back outside. If whoever is after you is nasty, then we need to get you out - you're the target here. Everything else is secondary."

"Mr. Stark -" Peter said nervously, rubbing his wrist as he glanced behind him. "Shouldn't we raise an alarm or something, then? With all these people here, things might get hairy."

The boy didn't question your fear, however illegitimate it might be - in fact, he seemed to take it every bit as seriously. Neither had the boy stepped aside to let the probably paranoid people run off - instead, he was sticking around, looking ready to punch somebody if need be. Heh. You were beginning to like the twerp already. He reminded you a little of Rhodey.

"I know you mean well, Peter, but a panic would just make people run around and get hurt. As long as we don't know what we're dealing with, keep things _quiet_."

The boy nodded in understanding. "...I know kung-fu. If we need it. I can totally kick ass."

"...Good to know," you said, grimacing to yourself when you realized that a sixteen-year old probably had more to offer than you did on that front. "Keep an eye out, will you? I'm gonna try and get us some recon," you muttered under your breath as you flipped open your phone. The holographic display came to life without even a flicker, and it took mere moment to type out a basic message, something pithy. You knew just who to call.

'_ JRVS - got trouble - listen in & alert auth'_

You didn't get a response beyond the briefest blinks of a LED, but that was quite enough - you'd designed the system to be covert. Getting a text to Jarvis was a little hypothetical you'd brought up in a lazy hour, just a week or two before - it was paying off far sooner than you'd expected. Of course, you hadn't expected a kidnapping scenario again so soon.

Seconds after you'd pressed send, the screen of your phone changed, and vague red text appeared, barely visible from more than a few inches away._ 'I am linked in. Currently analyzing venue for escape routes, alerting local authorities.'_

You nodded confidently, knowing that Jarvis was probably already hooked into every security camera around - he knew exactly where you were, after all. Judging from the crappy art style and the hideous paintings on the walls, the building had probably once been a museum - its security system had to be of some quality.

Pym didn't protest as you pushed him along through a throng of party-goers that clearly had no idea that anything might be wrong, and Peter dutifully made pictures, even though it was plenty clear that he wasn't paying attention to it in the slightest. His eyes kept focusing on the hallways that led deeper into the building.

'_All infrared sensors have been deactivated or uncoupled, sir - most of the security system has been physically disabled outside the main hall,'_ Jarvis reported, and you cursed under your breath. There went most of your reconnaissance._ 'I am currently listening in on chatter - several people have mentioned a 'man in red' that was seen in one of the side-corridors.'_

"Hank -" you said, and Pym started. "Did you get a look at who was stalking you? What was the guy wearing?"

"I don't know," Pym admitted. "I didn't see - it was dark…"

You frowned. "Right - that makes me wonder. What _were_ you doing back there? Anything beyond the main hall was cordoned off for a reason. There's not even any displays left, I'm guessing, if all the cameras are off…"

"...I don't suppose you'd accept curiosity as an answer?" Pym inquired a little sheepishly, before he looked away. "Alright… it was just, I thought I saw -" The man colored. "I thought I saw Janet, alright? She told me she didn't want to come with me, said she'd be bored, but then I saw her. I figured she was playing a joke on me, and slipped away into one of the back rooms to lure me over there. I thought she was trying to - um." He coughed nervously, his embarrassment briefly overpowering even the tinge of fear that wouldn't leave. "Well…"

"Lure you into doing unspeakable things in the strangest of places?" Peter said with a tiny smile. "I wouldn't know what that's like."

You would have told the boy off, but honestly your mind had landed in the exact same gutter.

"I'm guessing that just when you thought you'd be getting off, you were attacked," you concluded wryly. "That's low. Someone lured you in with the promise of booty, then just toyed with you instead..." You gestured vaguely to your neck as you stepped around a rather loud crowd. "It sounds like you've got some real crazies after you, you know. A proper assassin would have just killed you - and a proper kidnapper would have taken you in right then."

Pym gulped nervously as he nodded. "...It doesn't make sense."

Peter frowned. "Um, I don't suppose you happened to notice any - game show elements out there?" he inquired lamely. "Arcade type stuff? Funny hats and bright colors?" He quieted, scratching his head. "Ah. No, I suppose not…"

"Why would you even _think_…" you started to ask, mystified, but your phone buzzed in your hand and you gave up on figuring out the weird teen for the moment.

'_Transportation has arrived at the front of the building, sir. LVPD seems to be coping with DDOS attack and phone problems - likely intentional. It is doubtful they will arrive within ten minutes, even if I use alternative means of communication.'_

"They got to the cops already," you said in realization, and a shiver ran down your back in recognition. That meant the attack was now. You glanced over the crowd to find Pepper, but you didn't have to look hard. She was already heading towards you, apparently keeping her word about keeping an eye on you. She had to have noticed his odd behavior. "That was quick," you murmured.

"Tony? What are you doing, stalking across the floor like that? There's still ten minutes until the first talk, you know." Her annoyance seemed to fade away into vague alarm, then, probably because she noticed Pym's blood-spattered neck, or Peter's nervous glances. "Um… Is something wrong here?"

"Everything." You turned. "We're leaving. Now. No questions." You didn't wait for her answer before you set off towards the exit, straight for the leftmost doors, closest to the parking lot. You strained to see any familiar faces, but even punchable Reed was nowhere in sight. You could hear Pepper asking you for an explanation, but you ignored her - right now, getting her and the others out was more important than playing nice.

"Hank," you said sharply. "You're being targeted here. Do you know _why_?"

Pym hesitated momentarily, glancing to Peter and Pepper who were following closely behind you. "It's - that is, I invented something recently, something _big_, so it might have something to do with that," Pym started. "My old boss tried to steal the formula, but he got sent to jail after he tried to kill me with my own tools..." He shook his head. "I didn't think he'd try that, honestly."

"That's probably not a coincidence," you said dryly. "I'm guessing he's back to finish the job, and this time he's taking his sweet time to play around first. _Wonderful_."

Pym shrugged helplessly. "He's supposed to be locked up."

"What are you talking about?" Pepper demanded. "Who is targeting who?"

"Whom," you corrected. "Are you carrying pepper spray? Anyway, to bring you up to speed - assassins might be here, and we have to get the hell out. I need to know if you have pepper spray, since it seems so appropriate for you. Or a taser - whatever. Something nasty."

She looked flustered as she dug into her little purse, which seemed entirely too tiny to hold anything of note. "I have - hairspray?" Pepper suggested distantly, holding up a unicorn-imprinted bottle. "That's it, though. This is a _convention_, Tony - why would I have anything dangerous…?"

"Well, at least we'll look stylish when we die," Peter contributed distractedly with such a blank expression that for a moment you thought he was serious. "...What? I get quippy when I'm nervous. Like right now. Duh."

Well, it was a better reaction than that of some people, you reckoned. Your own version wasn't much more helpful - all you could think of was the frozen faces of the people who'd breathed Pyre, and you had a hard time ignoring the prickling in your side. Fun reminders.

You were utterly unarmed, and that was terrible news when nobody around had a gun either; not even a stun gun. For crying out loud, you didn't even have the benefit of _firecrackers_.

"Jarvis, got anything for me, here? Because Daddy needs some good news right about now."

'_I can be of very little assistance, sir. Some of the cameras in the main hall have infrared settings, and I am reading signals of what might be a person moving behind the walls on rare occasions - but they are faint and hard to track. I cannot be precise without detailed schematics."_

"Which you don't have, because, let me _guess_, they recently tore up this place to make room for a convention," you observed dryly. "Thanks anyway." You slipped the phone into your suit's pocket, sighing. "Well, we're pretty much on our own. If we can't make it out before they decide to screw the bystanders and make their move -"

"Then I'm dead," Pym said in a whisper as you reached the outer doors that led towards the outside. "I really -"

He didn't get to finish the sentence. You didn't even hear the detonation before the shock-wave slammed into you, and someone dragged you to the ground, out of the path of the explosive wave of debris that followed an instant later.

There was a brief, horrified silence as you felt Pepper besides you, thankfully moving.

Pym was on the floor on the other side, clasping hands to his ears.

Vaguely, you realized that Peter was the only one still upright, and that he had to have tossed you bodily away from whatever had exploded. That wiry build was hiding a _lot _of muscle. Kung-fu indeed.

Then the reporter slowly toppled backwards, blood gushing from everywhere as his clothes smoldered. The thin stream of smoke joined a huge pillar of black soot that was billowing out above you.

Finally, at long last, seconds after the blast, something like reality returned to your senses.

Then the screams started.

* * *

The air was filled with ash.

You didn't know how long it took before you were conscious again, but it couldn't have been very long, as you were still on the ground, still knocked silly. Someone stood near you, over you even, but your head spun too much to get any kind of directions.

"Well, howdy there!" That loud cry pierced through the screams of hundreds of party-goers as they made their way in a mad dash towards the other exits, fleeing for their lives. You were trying to focus on the here and now, still, but your sense of balance was entirely gone. You distantly realized that someone was firing a gun - or _guns_ - but you had no idea who.

"Yes, run! Run!" someone cried. "Makes it more fun!"

Peter was still on the ground, you noticed, but that told you nothing. It didn't help you make sense of what was going on. You could see a dozen people on the ground, perhaps dead - some of them were guards. Others - you didn't recognize them, but they had to be guests. A few people were still upright, but you had no clue who they were. Everything blurred together.

For a brief moment, you were back in the cave, back among the unknowing dead. _God damn it._ This was _twice_ in as many months that you'd gotten blown up. You didn't know if it was bad karma catching up to you, but it sucked. The world turned off for a few moments - and when you came back, you felt something sticky on your forehead, and a dull pain. You'd smashed your face on the floor, then, and cut open your scalp.

_But I'm still alive. We're all still alive. Right?_

"Pepper," you whispered as you blinked the stars away, and thankfully you felt her squeeze your hand, even though she stayed perfectly still on the floor. Either she'd been knocked for a loop like you had, or she was playing dead - which was not a terribly bad idea. You'd just ruined your own chances by moving, of course.

It was only then that you realized someone was speaking. _Yammering_, even.

"- really think that you're gonna get anywhere with those stupid little pop shooters?" the person standing in front of you asked loudly, gesturing with his over-sized gun. "Seriously, I could be fighting people with MAC-10's and other badass gear, and I have to deal with My First Second-Hand Glock? I was hoping for a bit of a challenge, here."

Oh, fuck - it was just getting through to you. There'd been a bomb, and the bomber was right there, right in front of you. You'd _failed_.

The bastard was wearing red - that was the first thing you noticed. Then you saw the weapons hanging on his belt, and you gaped. For fuck's sake, the asshole was carrying huge bloodied _swords_with him. You recognized it as weeaboo crap, katanas - but far too realistic to be fake. Now you knew what had cut Pym - even if it didn't make a lick of sense...

The man leaned down a little to look at you. "Well, lookie here - my colleague in kill-count is making googly eyes at me," the man commented from behind his face-covering mask, with two black circles around the eyes, surrounded by all the red.

Right at that moment, a bullet tore through the top of the assassin's shoulder with a spurt of blood - and the man didn't even _flinch_. In fact, he smiled. He looked up, his gaze focusing on somewhere behind you, probably looking at the shooter. "Well, that was awfully rude, wasn't it? Hold on for a minute."

He loosed a single shot from his oversized hand cannon, and there was a solid thud somewhere behind you. A body.

"There. That's much better, right? That makes eighteen dead cops now, nice and symmetrical, don't you think? This is something like a museum, so I gotta keep with the artsy theme, I suppose. All the red really brings out everyone's - well, organs I suppose? Fits my suit."

"What the…?" Peter mumbled confusedly, still on his back. You could see blood all over him - he'd been hit bad, even if he'd kept standing in the blast. The boy looked up at the assassin with fury burning in his eyes, but his hands seemed to cramp up as he tried to move, his fingers twitching without effect. You grabbed him by the arm, shoving him down, knowing he would only get himself killed.

The masked figure rubbed his neck as he waved his gun around in slow arcs. "Anyone else wanna try anything like that? No? Excellent! Because I've still got a lot of bullets to spread around like candy." He gave a thumbs up. "Got the message?"

There was a silence that lasted for seconds, but seemed far longer. The hall was mostly empty now of guests - you had no idea if any security guards were still alive. If police were on their way, they'd take minutes to arrive given Jarvis's estimates, and the assassin probably realized that. And even if there were other people trying to help out, you couldn't rely on that.

Well, time to keep him busy then.

"Hey, bastard," you managed to blurt out. "What do you want?!" It sounded clearer and more challenging than you thought you could manage. You pushed yourself up, slowly, your ears still ringing loudly. You managed another sentence, then: "Who the hell are you?"

Some of the pieces fell into place slowly, given your addled brain, even as you stared at the clown in front of you. This man had gotten full access to Hank Pym before, at least long enough to toy around with him in the abandoned corridors of the museum. Yet, he had set up explosives at the exit, probably to cause as much collateral damage as possible. If not for Peter's reaction, you might well have all died.

This had to be about causing fear, making the assassination as public as possible. So, this guy was another straight-up terrorist wannabe.

You were getting awfully tired of those.

The red figure smirked below his mask, you could tell. "Ah, you want to know who I am? Well, I'm just the hired gun here, Starkypoo! Haven't come for you, of course. Us mercy types like you. You give us all our best toys, after all!"

You didn't know what to say to that. Something inside shriveled up in shame.

The mercenary drew up his mask a little, exposing a malicious grin in a pockmarked face. "Example _Uno_. See this? This is what the good old US of A did to me - or Canada, but who cares about the details? Military experiments, you know, ever since the Forties. Fun stuff, making human weapons! I hear that your daddy had a lot to do with it…"

A shiver ran down your back as you remembered the stories of the Second World War, and the projects that spun off from there. Vibranium, its alloys, the illegal experiments with super-formulas that were stopped not long after, when HYDRA got eradicated. This was about Weapon Plus, the attempts to remake Captain America. Fuck.

"I see that you know what I'm talking about," the scarred man said jovially. "There were a lot of failed _upgrades_ from that little horror-zone your dad inspired. We had a betting pool, see who would die first out of us failures… but I didn't." He grinned. "That's how I got my nickname, y'know. Seemed fitting."

"Whatever," you muttered distractedly as you stared at the man.

"Ah…" The mercenary said. "I see not everyone is paying attention…" The man's foot shot out and you cringed, but his kick landed squarely in Pepper's ribs, and she cried out in pain. "Well hello, sunshine - yes, I knew you were awake. Hi! My name is _Deadpool_." He licked his lips, smiling, and then turned to Pym, drawing one of his swords. "And 'ello there, Henry - or should I say Henrietta, after I'm done with you? Won't matter in a few minutes, I suppose. But sheesh, the man who hired me is one sick puppy..."

"You - won't -" You managed to get to your knees, panting, and Deadpool paid no attention to you except a sort of passing interest, perhaps curious to see what you would do.

Best not to disappoint - or you were very dead.

* * *

The moment seemed to freeze, and the world slowed.

You knew you needed to stall for time in order to allow the others to get away, even if it meant risking the assassin's attention onto yourself. Deadpool wasn't after you, but you could not let him take another life without protest, not when you could stop it. You had saved Yinsen's life before, after all - this was no different.

When the moment came you made your decision, you didn't hesitate. You were not sure quite when you'd grasped the lighter in your pocket, but it was already in your hand, clasped between your fingers so tightly that it hurt. Your other hand crawled away from Pepper, who trembled at the loss, and it dove into the purse that was right beside her.

You prayed her hairspray was the flammable kind.

With his focus mostly on Pym, Deadpool said something - probably an inane comment again - but you weren't really listening to him. You were still on your knees, breathing heavily as dust clogged up your throat, but that changed quickly. with a single painful movement you dragged yourself upright onto painful feet, and in the same instant you lashed out.

The assassin grasped your wrist before you could even reach his face. The man stared at your lighter with a baffled expression that swiftly turned into a grin.

"Well, that's certainly… _something_. You're gonna flick your bic at me?" Deadpool asked mirthfully as he shook his head. "This is a no-smoking area," he noted gleefully, grinning from below his mask. "Didn't you see the signs everywhere? Such a deviant..."

You didn't know if the asshole had simply missed the little spray can in your other hand, tiny as it was, or if he'd dismissed it as mere pepper-spray, ineffective against his face-covering mask, but that didn't really matter. One of Deadpool's hands was occupied holding yours, and the other was still aimed at Pym - neither could protect him now.

Your free hand darted up, and you pressed the tiny button on top with a grim satisfaction.

With a burst of bubbling gas, and the briefest of hisses that sent shivers of recognition down your back, a liquid wave of fire ballooned outwards from the lighter, past the hand that still held your wrist and bursting outwards against the red-and-black of the assassin's mask. For a fraction of a second the flame seemed suspended in mid-air, impossibly wild and hot for coming from such a tiny source, pure fury. For an instant, it was blue-white like unleashed _Pyre_.

Then Deadpool's face was on fire.

"What the f-" The assassin cried out in a mixture of surprise and shock, as the white-hot flames licked at his mask, biting into the fabric even as he pulled it off his face, exposing what was beneath. The rest of him wasn't any prettier than his previously revealed jaw - he looked like a slab of meat, cooked jerky, even without burns. He glared as he slapped out the fire on his own face, his original target forgotten.

The distraction had only been short, but it was enough - Peter was there, and his fist landed on the assassin's wrist with surprising force, knocking the man's arm away from you. The next of Peter's punches was considerably nastier, landing on the bastard's throat with a sickening crunch, and judging from Deadpool's expression, that had been a _bad_ decision. The red-clad killer twisted away, his gun flinging around to face a new target, and he fired.

You weren't sure you'd seen it right, as Peter ducked so quickly that it seemed impossible. It was as if he knew what to avoid before it even happened. The bullet went wild, burrowing itself into the crumpled remains of the wall. The reporter - who seriously knew his kung-fu - took immediate advantage, slapping the assassin's hand aside with enough force that his gun went flying.

Barely more than twenty seconds had passed since your original assault, and in the instant of silence that seemed to follow the clatter of the gun on the floor, you glanced down to Pepper. She had rolled out of the way, thankfully, but where she had been you noticed something else. Crushed and broken, the remains of Peter's camera gleamed up at you. The broken glass and high-quality straps jumped out at you, and you had no time to rethink the spur-of-the-moment excuse for a plan that occurred to you. You only had seconds to spare.

Whatever it was that Deadpool had expected, it clearly wasn't Peter - the boy's vicious moves, despite his bruised body, had caught the man completely off guard. The assassin was disoriented, in pain, evidently quite incapable of speaking - a smell blessing - and utterly furious. A perfect blend for making mistakes.

There was no holding back, now. No time to do this nice and calm. Kill, think later. Just as Peter got hit in the side of the head with a meaty fist that rattled bones, you flung yourself back at the brute. "Hey, ugly!" you barked, and the man glanced at you out of reflex - just in time to receive a rain of shards and razors-sharp glass dust into his face.

The killer's agonized scream was _horrifying_, but you didn't stop for a second. Before he could recover, before he could grasp a gun or a sword and run you through, you wrapped the strap of Peter's camera around his neck, and _twisted_.

It seemed to work for a split second - but then it fell apart. Deadpool was _impossibly_ strong, and his hands came up and ripped yours away as if they were nothing. He snapped the thick straps around his neck with a single harsh tug that tore into his skin, but it was nothing on top of the bleeding he was already doing. He turned towards you with pure hate in his eyes, and it was clear that he'd forgotten all about Pym, now. He'd even forgotten about Peter, who was nursing his head with a dazed expression.

Right now, he was totally focused on you, and you were unarmed. You were screwed.

"That wasn't very nice... Let's see how you like pain," he hissed from a tortured throat, and he grasped you by the neck, _squeezing_ until your breath refused to come, and spots began to appear in the corners of your eyes as your heartbeat hammered in your ears. You tried to struggle feebly against him as it seemed something in your throat gave way, but his grip was too strong._Superhuman_. Weapon Plus, you remembered.

You mouthed the foulest curse you could think of, even as everything began to wobble. You did not want to die - but it hardly looked like you got much of a choice. You tried desperately to kick, to hit Deadpool in some vulnerable place -

And then there was blessed release. An influx of air rushed through your protesting throat, and you let out a pained sob that was echoed by Pepper's from somewhere nearby. Deadpool stared at you in mute incomprehension, blinking slowly at his own quivering arm. Very calmly, his other hand raised up towards his face.

The assassin touched something on the side of his head. Something that was in the side of his head, you realized dazedly. From his temple sprouted an arrow. The man mouthed something, and then grimaced. "Not again," he whispered hoarsely, with an expression of such outrage that it was almost funny. Then his eyes rolled into the back of his skull.

You fell with him to the floor, and everything was red for a while.

Distantly, you heard a voice, an older man's call. "I am a licensed physician!" he stated, and you felt fingers on your throat. "Don't worry - this won't take long at all," he said, and a spreading woolly warmth emanated from his grip, until it engulfed everything and dragged you under.

* * *

You'd woken in surprise under the glare of bright lamps, staring at an unfamiliar ceiling, and for an instant you'd imagined yourself back in the cave, back in captivity. But instead, as you'd gazed around, things resolved into a luxurious hospital room, all things considered - but still a hospital room. It was slightly better than the alternative, but not by much.

Peter lay in the bed next to yours, bandaged up the wazoo, but he hadn't woken yet. You were sort of unwilling to wake him from the rest that he certainly deserved, but judging from the thick bandages on his ears he wouldn't be hearing much for a while, anyway.

"This makes twice in as many months," you said softly as you rubbed your throat, glaring with a dejected expression into the mirror at your side. You looked like hell - your face was covered in cuts. Peter, by the virtue of youth, was probably recovering twice as fast as you were, and you were rather jealous. "I really need to stop doing these things…"

The form on the other side of the room moved slightly, his face appearing from the shadows for only a few moments. He had been there since the moment you woke, keeping an eye out even in the peace of the sterile room. "It happens to the best of us," the man said. "This whole - trouble thing. You're hardly unique."

"What are the odds?" you inquired dryly.

"Those who put themselves in harm's way can expect harm," the dark shape said lightly. "You went to Afghanistan - it's not exactly the world's great tourist spot. And this time, you went out of your way to escort a man that you had good reason to believe had killers after him. It seems to me it was your own decisions that led to all this."

"Don't I know it," you muttered, thinking back to the moment you'd first seen your guest - holding the bow that had saved you from suffocation. "Look, you've been standing there for an hour. Are you going to shoot things again, if some new madman starts shooting in here? Who actually uses a bow anymore? What are you, Twenty-first Century Robin Hood?"

The archer snorted at that. "Nah. I think I'd be robbing you if that were the case, right? I've done worse, believe me," he noted. "Just call me Hawkeye. It's a - professional nickname, if you will. I don't usually do things like this, but when needs must…" He shrugged. "I tend to handle the difficult situations."

"You're an assassin too, I'm guessing?" You conjectured. "So, are you some kind of security, then? Somebody put us in a room with a killer of killers?" You frowned as you thought back to the convention hall with a shiver. "And - you came rather late to the party, didn't you? At least eighteen people died before you arrived!"

"Sixteen, actually," Hawkeye corrected morosely. "Two of the guards are expected to pull through. They were hit by the original detonation - because Deadpool does tend to be rather accurate with his gunfire, unfortunately."

"Make that past tense," you corrected. "You killed the bastard, remember?"

Hawkeye shrugged lightly. "Eh, he used to, whatever. Anyway, we were alerted when it became clear that you'd become involved in something problematic. We have certain classified sources of information that helped warn us of the problem. Unfortunately, I was some distance away, and Deadpool was well-prepared."

"We?" you inquired slowly. "Who is that? FBI, NSA?"

"Psh. I'm not an amateur," Hawkeye said, pulling a face. "I'm with S.H.I.E.L.D. - stands for something or the other, it's a mouthful. We tend to do the tough stuff that nobody else can handle, the nasty things. We get all the cool James Bond gadgets."

You nodded. "So, let me guess - you do spying, assassination, and sweet accents?"

"Among other things," the archer agreed. "We've been keeping an eye on you, Mr. Stark. Your recent rumble in Afghanistan raised some eyebrows, and this little affair certainly hasn't helped matters." He shifted a little. "Let's be frank here. We were tapping into local cameras at the old museum to keep track of your activities, in case you exhibited any - troubling allegiances."

You stared at him blankly. "Like what, exactly?"

Hawkeye frowned. "There have been some troubling dealings of late by supposed suppliers of Stark Industries materials - and the doctor you rescued has been connected to certain less than savory elements. We have been watchful, needless to say."

You blinked in surprise, hardly believing your ears. "You're talking about Yinsen being a _traitor_? No way."

"Way. Something interesting happened when we were observing you, though," Hawkeye continued. "Just when things started heating up, and you seemed to display classic signs of anxiety, fear and subterfuge, our cameras cut out." He narrowed his eyes. "_Someone _took them over, and we didn't know it was you at the time. Given that the local law enforcement had to deal with major problems as well, we naturally assumed the worst."

"You thought those things were connected," you decided. "That's why you came?"

The man nodded distractedly. "Deadpool had preemptively covered a lot of his tracks, and made sure we would be delayed - but he didn't anticipate someone else mucking about besides him. As it turns out, that was a lucky mistake. We got the bastard before he even realized we were on-site, and his target remained alive. So did you, obviously."

"Score one for Jarvis," you muttered under your breath.

"Hmm. The problem now, of course, is that everyone who saw that little struggle is a witness to some sensitive details, and whoever hired the mouthy mercenary is still out there. Thankfully, the few guards that were on the outside when the bomb went off evacuated the lion's share of attendees, and Deadpool let a lot of people go. That limited the exposure by a large margin."

You nodded slowly. "Right. Weapon Plus and all that, I'm sure. And you're telling me this, because…"

"Can't you guess?" The SHIELD agent smirked. "As of right now, you are getting one of our operatives stationed within your vicinity whenever you leave home. No debates about that. Whether or not this attack is related to your kidnapping or not, you are in definite danger. Until we can be certain that you are safe, we cannot afford to slack off. We were already nearly too late, this time."

"Great. And I'm guessing I'll always be in danger by some definition," you observed dryly.

Hawkeye smiled. "Hey, now you're getting it. Chin up - I did save your life back there."

You reluctantly nodded. "True. Thanks for that - even if it was a bit close for comfort." You looked over to your side, to the sleeping Peter, and frowned. "Is the boy going to be alright? He took quite a beating back there - and I think I owe him a camera or twenty after what he did. Jumped in front of a bullet, that one..."

The archer nodded. "Yeah, he's fine. More than fine. Strong constitution, killer stamina - he'll be back up and running soon." Hawkeye paused, narrowing his eyes at you for a long moment. "...This is something that you'll have to keep to yourself: Doctor Pym's been escorted to a safe location, along with his wife. SHIELD will be keeping an eye on those two. I have taken the liberty of handing a copy of his number to your charming assistant. Please keep in mind that it's a SHIELD number."

"Pepper's okay?" You demanded, but the agent's relaxes mile said enough. "Right. Of course she is." Despite your words, you were uncomfortably aware how close things had come, how very near to death she might have been. The flip of a coin - alive or dead.

"Well, now that you're up to speed - time for the problematic stuff." The man smiled. "There's a few papers you'll have to sign - and they're non-negotiable. They're nothing big, all things considered - but you can consider them tasters."

You sighed tiredly. "Oh, joy. _Bureaucracy_."

* * *

"You know, Pepper - I suddenly feel uncomfortably old," you said pensively as you hobbled towards the exit on legs that were still recovering from the strain of your rough tumble, when the explosion has briefly removed all ups and downs. A little ways ahead of you, looking entirely unruffled by the same blast that had caught him far more directly, Peter showed no hint of strain or pain.

"Well, you really are not a spring chicken anymore," Pepper said with a small smile. "Old man."

You grunted with begrudging acknowledgement, but your gaze lingered on the boy. You hadn't had nearly enough time to consider things in the fight with the assassin, as it had been such a hectic and fast moment that you'd barely kept up with yourself. Afterwards, though, lying in your bed staring at the ceiling, you realized something strange - something amazing.

Deadpool had been an experiment of the Weapon Plus program, by his own admission - some illegal offshoot of the same project your father had been a part of, the creation of Captain America. He had been _enhanced_, even if the same experiments had ruined him as well. You'd felt his grip, his vicious self-control that bit through even the toughest pain in mere seconds. A bullet had barely phased him, and he had shown no signs of tiring yet.

And Peter had disarmed him with a _slap_.

You hadn't mentioned it to the young reporter, keeping yourself to gratitude and an offer for reparations, but you couldn't stop thinking about that moment. If Deadpool was superhuman, an enhanced soldier, then what was Peter? And what would he do, if you were to bring it up? Would he freak? Would he even know what you were talking about?

You had a pretty good idea what the government might think, given your own history. The concept of an arms race was not new to you, and anyone would kill for another Captain America.

"Jarvis," you muttered, bringing your phone to your ear. It had cracked somewhere in the fight, but it still worked. "Are you there?"

"_Of course, sir."_

"I think it's time to remove yourself from the system here - we're all leaving," you said, hesitating. "...You have access to all the video footage, right?"

"_I have made backups, sir."_

"Yeah…" You glanced at Peter again, and nodded to yourself. "Right. For now - delete all the footage here, and save the backups on my private server. Encrypt them with my personal pass code."

"_Are you certain? That will likely lead to difficult questions…"_

You sighed. "Yeah. But right now, hardly anybody knows how you work, so I can get away with things. I need time to think about what to do with all this stuff."

"_Understood_. _Deleting remote video feeds, and any remote backups."_

"Thank you."

It was a disquieting notion, to realize that the stories you'd heard in your youth might be spilling into the modern world. Tales of Cap and Bucky, of the super-soldiers that had fought a shadow war against Nazi and USSR counter-agents, has seemed so terribly distant just a day ago. Now, the whole mess was in your face again - and those same super soldiers might be after you, and walking besides you without even a hint as to their nature. Wonderful.

But at least, you reckoned, you were alive. You knew now what was out there, at least in part. It was time to get back to the Garage - because it was high time to change the stakes in your favor.

As you walked out into the atrium, a few people looked at you when you entered, meeting your gaze. Reed was there, looking subdued, and the doctor who you vaguely recognized from before, still wearing his flamboyant cape. The red-haired woman that you'd seen was also present, now alone, her eyes downcast.

"Do you think…?" you asked to Pepper, unsure how to finish the sentence, though the point came across. You weren't sure if you were up for trying to make sense of what happened just yet. About what you'd done, to save another. Doing nasty things for justifiable purposes was becoming an uncomfortable theme of your life, lately.

Your secretary glanced at you slowly, rubbing the bandage on her arm nervously as she looked at you with tired eyes. "This has all been - too much, Tony. Just… let's just go home..."

* * *

You knew Happy was waiting outside, ready to drive you back to Malibu, back to familiar places, and safe beds, and the ring of a hammer on a workbench. Whatever you'd hoped to find here among your colleagues and adversaries, you weren't sure if you'd found it. There had been no discussions, no presentations, no drunken debates - the entire affair had scarcely moved past its first act before it was cut short. But perhaps you'd learned _something_.

This was not how you'd imagined things, at all. Not even last steps to the door seemed lengthier than they were, and you noticed the people looking in your direction. Not judging - but that scarcely made things better.

Reed bore an expression that betrayed his own uncertainty, and you had a fair grasp of why he was feeling so conflicted. He'd seen in you a coward - someone who hid behind his creations and not his convictions, a person who bragged, but did not act. Perhaps he had seen his mirror image in you. And maybe he had even been right - until that _cave_. Until the moment you had claimed the necessary evils as your own.

Now he saw you as you were. Foolish, perhaps - but at least not a coward. You braved assassins to rescue a man you scarcely knew, assaulted someone who had all possible advantages, who held your death in the palm of his hand. If not for sheer luck, you would have sacrificed yourself without even thinking twice, to save another. Many things could be said about your split-second decisions - but none could dismiss that they had been made.

A little further along, the caped Doctor smiled at you, and you nodded back at him with something like gratitude, though you were sure he knew what you wanted to say. The man had an air of sophisticated mystery about him, and you rather thought he intended it that way. Who were you to mess with a good thing? You looked away, content to know that you had his approval, though you didn't know why that mattered.

There was others there, other faces, but only one weighed on your mind, one person that you hadn't spoken to yet beyond mere platitudes. If you did not speak now, that would be all - and you knew that would be too hasty. "Can you wait for me for a few minutes, Pepper?" you asked then, your eyes sliding to the last face that was on your mind. "I have something to say - to Peter."

The boy turned as you spoke despite his bandaged ears, and you had a suspicion that he had played up his deafness and hoodwinked the nurse. It seemed to fit in his peculiar pattern, though you brought no attention to it among so many witnesses. This was not the place to get into such things. Peter seemed utterly calm under your gaze, but you could tell that he was tense below that feigned serenity. Like you.

"I suppose that's alright," Pepper said besides you, her worried frown making way for something like compassion. She glanced to the doors. "Five minutes, then. You know how Happy dislikes waiting..."

Five minutes. You had no idea what you could really say in such a short time, such an eternity - you were speechless, and at the same time you had too many things to say. You couldn't bring up your suspicions, of course, and the boy was in truth still a stranger, if not for the brief shared horror of the previous days. Did you have anything to say at all?

Four minutes. Think fast.

"I suppose you'll be heading home without photos," you observed at last, looking at the small bag that Peter held to his chest. It was filled with the remains of the boy's expensive camera, now a pile of parts and broken plastic - certainly a setback for someone of limited means. But you knew what the boy would say before you even offered your help. You had tried before. "...Just let me buy you a new one. Please?"

Peter shook his head. "Nah, don't worry about it. It was a loan from the paper, anyway - I think I can excuse its loss given what happened. Besides, I'm pretty sure the memory card's okay, so I should have pictures." He smiled tiredly. "I can take care of myself."

You nodded, frowning. "Yeah, you keep saying that. I get it. But you saved my life, and that kinda thing is not something I let slide. See, I can only repay you in a few ways - and money is easy. Money is something I have a lot of." You slipped a hand in your pocket, retrieving a little card with your address and number. "And if that's not to your liking… Well, if you don't mind a teeny-tiny detour before you head home, I'd like you to come by the company. I'll pay for your transport and broken equipment, and in exchange you - humor me. How does that sound?" You hesitated. "I've got a little - proposal for you."

That very proposal was still rattling around in your skull, constructing itself as you spoke. You hadn't really thought about offering anything substantial before just now, but you knew you couldn't let the opportunity slide now that it had occurred to you. The company would question things, of course, if you hired an unknown in any sort of official capacity, or paid out a scholarship - but you had the money and control to offer it, and there was no telling if Peter would even accept. You had a feeling it would be worth it, though.

You had done crazier things for worse people.

Asking whether or not Peter was clever enough hadn't been something you'd worried about since you'd seen that piercing stare back in the convention hall, when Pym's plight became clear. You'd recognized understanding in that gaze, a shrewdness that could not be trained or feigned. Judging from Peter's expression in the present, the boy was just as quick on the uptake this time. He had recognized your implication for what it was.

"...Really?" he asked curiously.

"Yes. A kid like you should have options. Think about it, would you?" you offered. "Don't constrain yourself too much with that humility. Just - consider things. That's all I can ask."

Peter was silent for a long moment. "Yeah… I will," he responded at last, nodding confidently. "And thank you, Mr. Stark."

You scoffed as you stepped back towards the doors. "I don't tolerate formality from people who saved my bacon. Call me Tony - but _never_ Anthony, unless you're my mother. Or Pepper. Eh - same difference, really."

Pepper's huff was audible from clear across the room, and you couldn't help smiling.

* * *

"Were you serious back there?" Pepper asked more than half an hour later, as you cruised down the highway towards home, the wind whipping through the small slit of the window by your side. You'd almost dozed off for a moment, though your mind had still been as active as ever. A pencil that had been precariously balancing between your fingers almost slipped away.

"...About what?" You wondered, blinking.

"That - reporter. I've never…" She frowned, her troubled expression all too common in the last few days. "I thought you hated kids, Tony? You always skip out on visiting schools, and you're perpetually whining about colleges…"

You raised an eyebrow as you turned to glance at her. "Were you listening in back there? That's bad form, Miss Potts…" You slipped the pencil behind your ear, and smiled. "I don't hate kids, Pepper - I just loathe _ignorance_. And you won't believe how much of that goes around in schools, let met tell you... It's why I skipped out on going any further than I did. I'd learned all I could from MIT - all my doctorates are honorary."

"Ignorance, huh?" Pepper grimaced. "And yet you will gladly share a table with a politician."

"Yes, well, one does have to make sacrifices," you said lightly. "An ignorant man in power, I've found, is a malleable target. Nothing is as effective at getting a few good bills passed in my favor than taking advantage of a man's shortsightedness and greed." You shrugged. "But - that was not what you were going for, was it? It's not about the young - or the ignorant. You were wondering about Peter himself."

"Yes." She shook her head. "You call him by his first name - a teen. A penniless one, from what you've told me, who struggles to make ends meet by making photographs. By his own admission, this was probably the poshest place he's ever been - and it's a boring yearly convention that barely gets the news unless something _terrible_ happens. Like now."

You nodded. "You're absolutely right."

"So… what could you possibly have in common with someone like that?" She cocked her head to the side curiously. "I don't get it. I might have attributed it to the bomb, to that madman with the guns - but I saw you talking with the boy like you'd met him years ago, before all that. I saw you speak to him like you do with Rhodey. You were - less standoffish than I remember. It's… like you're a different person."

"I was never very standoffish with the _women_," you reminded her playfully, but she didn't react. You looked away, shrugging. "Am I different after Afghanistan? Maybe. Maybe I saw my own reflection out there in the desert, and perhaps I didn't much like what I saw. Peter might remind me of other days." You turned back to her. "Or maybe it's something else entirely, and I'm talking out of my ass. It doesn't matter."

She rolled her eyes. "As usual, you're not making much sense."

You smiled. "I know. But as long as it makes sense to _me_, that's fine." You nodded to yourself. "I've invited Peter over - if I'm right, he'll be there tomorrow, or the day after. I'll take him to the company, show him around. Give him a sneak peek into my works in progress, so he can take a scoop home. And maybe…" You smiled. "Well, we'll see."

"...I really don't get this."

"I think you will," you murmured as you turned back to the sketch that was propped up on your knee, something you'd been working on since you left. You grasped your pencil again, and got back to sketching dimensions, listing possible materials.

On the paper, a figure took shape, an artificial star as its heart. An image of the future.

* * *

"Daddy's back from near-death and probable PTSD - again," you said as you clapped twice. The lights blinked on as you descended the stairs. "Jarvis, it's freezing in here. Get me some warmth and a cold beer, would you?" You sniffed at the metal-tinged air, and smiled. "You've finished the next reactor, then? You've been using that newfangled printer again, haven't you?"

"_You are correct - and welcome back, sir,"_ Jarvis replied. _"I am - glad that I could be of assistance, however limited, in the events that occurred."_

"Yeah - if I died, who would keep you running?" You joked as you strode into your workshop, glancing over the whiteboards on the walls, relics from a time before holographs. They would serve a new purpose, you reasoned, as you pulled out some of the sketches you'd made on your way back. "Pepper's been hounding me to get sleep - so I think I'll make this an all-nighter. I've got ideas aplenty, and a double-duty sick leave to abuse."

Jarvis let out a noise that might well have been a sigh._ "Of course, sir."_

Though you had shaken off the tremors of shock that had persisted in the wake of Deadpool's violent attempt on your life, you didn't feel properly safe until you'd returned here, to the garage, with your things around you. It was no different from Afghanistan - just another violent episode in your crazy new life. The whiteboards and holographs, workbenches and hammers, they were the furniture of your real house, a proper sanctum.

This was where you could see the future. Not literally - or not supernaturally, at any rate - but in your own work, in the plans you drew up and the ideas you had. The garage had been where Jarvis had been born, where your first integrated circuit had been soldered together, when your father wasn't using it. That was technically another garage, of course, but the principle was the same. This was where the magic happened.

"Well, what do you reckon I should work on?" you murmured, not really expecting an answer from the AI. You removed your sketches from your pocket, and one by one stuck them onto the whiteboards with little refrigerator magnets. Crude - but it reminded you of the old days, when you'd gotten started. Some of the pictures were of arc reactor parts, of new designs - others were guns, or inspired by them, though turned towards a new purpose. Repulsors, a lost concept that might be reborn - new holographic technology, new computers architecture.

The last picture was still in your pocket, but you weren't sure if it'd been a serious idea. You'd been napping, almost, when it had popped up. You remembered considering the concept in the cave, swept aside by an idea that had turned out to be far from ideal. You'd made a sketch then, too, but it had gone onto the pyre just as much as everything else.

"_There is someone at the door, sir."_

You glanced up, as you still tended to do out of reflex whenever Jarvis surprised you. "Really? Pepper's still out, isn't she?"

"_It is a gentleman in a suit - he is holding up an identification to the camera."_ One of the screens to your side switched on to an image of the visitor. He seemed a rather stiff fellow in a suit, though he was smiling in a friendly manner. The badge he was showing carried the insignia of a bird in black on white. S.H.I.E.L.D.

Well, you'd expected them to come by at some point - the man you'd met, Hawkeye, had certainly implied it. You weren't really expecting them less than ten minutes after you'd returned to the house, though. Still - there was no sense in keeping the agent waiting, however amusing it would be to watch him squirm.

"Let him in, Jarvis," you said, turning back to your workshop. "Leave the rest to me."

"_Sir? Do you wish me to escort the gentleman downstairs?"_

"Yeah. I'm not going to adjust my schedule because of an impromptu visit - I'm just going to get to work," you said distractedly as you picked up the half-finished repulsor prototype that had been on your wall for nearly a decade now. A quick puff of breath dislodged a small cloud of toxic-looking yellow dust, the remains of degraded plastics. "...Ugh, this is gonna be a total redo, I think."

Cleaning out and adjusting the repulsor prototype was complicated and intricate enough that you found yourself moving between several different tools, all of which were spread around your basement - some elements required micrometer precision, others were much more fiddly. You switched from sintering some metal together to reorganizing the wires that had decayed, and that took some doing in itself.

It didn't occur to you until almost half an hour later that someone had been at the door.

You looked up, and blinked in surprise at the sight of the suited man from before, sitting not ten feet away from you at the side of the room. He was sipping on a cup of coffee that Jarvis had doubtlessly supplied. "Ah… Hello there," he said awkwardly as he rose, still with that smile that seemed altogether too genuine to be false. He stuck out his hand. "You were - rather busy. Seemed like it'd be a shame to bother you. I'm Agent Phil Coulson with the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division."

"Quite a mouthful indeed," You muttered, bemused, as you ignored his hand. "You know who I am, I would hope. Otherwise, get out of my house you scoundrel." You turned to your bench, and frowned. "Anyway, you're a patient man. More than me, anyway."

"Is it patience to watch the master ply his trade?" Coulson said, raising his eyebrows. "It was enlightening, actually - and your robot brews remarkably superb coffee." He looked to the side, to the wall, and nodded. "You also have intriguing artwork."

There, behind him on a shelf, an unfinished replica model of Captain America's shield was propped up next to some other half-finished products.

"That's not art, though it might as well be," you admitted. "Half a lifetime ago, when I made that thing, I had some wild scheme that I'd recreate the material that the old shield was made of. I figured that it wouldn't be proper without recreating the look, too. I never got close to the real stuff, of course." You looked away. "Maybe I'll get around to it."

The agent nodded. "I would appreciate that. I am a bit of an enthusiast." He coughed. "That is, of course - not why I'm here. Though it's interesting." He turned back to his coffee. "The assassin known as Deadpool isn't a new face. Not where I'm from, anyway. He's been in and out of hiding for years, but he's been keeping a low profile of late."

"...Really now?" you said calmly. "He blew up a convention hall and killed sixteen people. You call that _hiding_?"

Coulson shrugged. "Well, every pattern gets broken sometime. My boss has reason to believe that Deadpool was hired to make that scene, since he's so very good at that. Pym was the target, but he was meant to be a message to someone else. His death was to function as a threat, or at the very least a sadistic statement of intent." He nodded to you. "Given your own recent kidnapping, a connection is - likely. Even probable, given some information we have obtained."

You paused. "So you're telling me someone went after Pym to send a message to _me_? What, they somehow knew about his little invitation, and they figured - why not shoot the guy to prove a point?" You shook your head. "Why not just kill me right there? Not that I'm particularly fond of that idea, but you gotta admit..."

"That's the question, isn't it? We don't know yet." Coulson leaned back in his chair, sipping at his drink. "Regardless of that, there's only a few ways this kind of thing tends to go from here. One option is to put you in witness protection, but we both know that's not a likely option in your case. Option two is putting more security up, and hoping that it'll be enough to handle whoever comes after you for real. Option three…"

"Yes...?"

"You wouldn't much like option three, I'm afraid," Coulson said mildly. "We're sweeping every network we have access to - and that's pretty much all of them - but we can't catch everything. So you'll have to be ready to evacuate quickly, when we say so. No complaining."

"Hey, who's complaining around here?" You said, arms up in surrender. "If you want to shoot assassins in the face, that's entirely your prerogative. In fact, if you need the guns to do so, I'm sure I can arrange a few. I would like to stay unshot, thank you."

"Good. Then you won't mind cooperating. The Director was worried that you'd, well…" His smile faded. "You have a reputation, suffice to say." The agent grabbed the briefcase by his side, and offered it to you.

"...I don't like to be handed things," you muttered, gesturing to the table. The agent obliged, flipping it open and turning it towards you.

"This is a contract proposal. If you were amenable to reason, I was told to offer certain - incentives to get you to play along. I have an offer from S.H.I.E.L.D. here - to supply the eye in the sky, and in return gain access to the best protection money can't buy. And a whole lot more, of course."

"...You want to be a customer?" You said after a long moment. "Secretive spy organization with archers and crap in service, and you want my toys? Can't you just get them from the army, like everyone seems to these days, whether they pay or not?"

Coulson tapped the briefcase. "No sarcasm. Please, read this first. If the writing seems familiar - that's because it was written by one of our founding members. A certain Howard Stark."

You froze. "What? _Founding_ member, you said?"

The agent nodded shortly as you read a few loose passages of the contract, the grime on your fingers staining the paper. You'd never really know what your father got up to, beyond running the business. You hadn't pegged him as being the kind of man to start a spy organization. Then again, you had not really known him that much at all.

"...It says here that S.H.I.E.L.D. would have influence on… Yeah. The company." You looked up, eyes narrowed. "See, that's not going to happen. Dad might have included that because he was a founding member or whatever, but I'm not going to let that count. And I expect some info on that, because it's news to me."

"I'm sure that negotiations can be made," Coulson said calmly. "It is only a first draft. Written by monkeys on typewriters, I'm sure."

"Make a better one, and I'll consider it," you replied, closing the suitcase. "I'm working on changing things around here, and in my company - and I can't have you waltzing in here and demanding I change what I'm doing, just because it doesn't fit with whatever your boss wants. Whoever he is. I can protect myself if need be."

Coulson looked skeptical, but nodded. "I will pass that along."

"Good. Now - if you don't mind, I was _working_. Seeing as I've spent the last few weeks getting tortured, blown up and generally being assaulted, I could use a break from all this crap." You stood up. "I've got to make up for lost time - and I have got some good ideas. Proprietary ones. That means _get out._"

"...Understood," Coulson said as he picked up the contract. "It was nice to meet you, Mr. Stark."

You ignored the man's hand again, and felt like he was someone you could tolerate, far more than the guy with bow and arrows. "Same to you, Agent."

As the agent's footsteps faded, you turned back to the whiteboard. The last sketch, the humanoid figure, joined the rest.

* * *

**Interlude - Obadiah**

You weren't sure when things had gone sour; when a relative peace had turned into this cold and distant void, this terrible nothingness. You'd never really _liked_ the boy, of course - he was vain, self-important, and egocentric like his father, but with added unpredictability and a startling lack of foresight. But at the same time, you'd assumed that the guarded agreement between you would last, even if there was no love lost.

You moved the knight forward on the board, then sideways a step - in reality, it seemed more like that step had been backwards - if not for one thing. Far from continuing the game you'd been playing, it seemed as if the boy had forgotten it altogether, and started a new one. His head was in the clouds, caught up in plans and dreams that you'd long thought he'd abandoned. Perhaps - perhaps there was a chance.

"I have reconsidered our arrangement," you said slowly, frowning at the board as your competitor's slim fingers picked up a pawn to move it. "I do not want you to continue. I don't know that the solution you offered me is - required anymore."

She didn't answer, her face a mask as she stared at you.

"Are you even listening to me?" You demanded. "I need time. Time to make sure of some things, of what I want." You gestured at the board, scowling. "The game has changed. I can't predict the moves anymore, and that means trouble. But at the same time, there's no guarantee that when he chooses his steps, they'll be bad ones. I have already seen signs that he might have had - an epiphany. I have to wait it out."

The lady sighed, shaking her head slowly. "Ah, Mr. Stane… You seem to be under a misapprehension about what I do, and more importantly, _why_."

"I know _enough_," you answered bluntly. "Three months ago, you told me that it would all be over soon. You told me it would be quick and clean! Instead you posture, and you dawdle, and make everything harder than it needs to be. I have problems to deal with, people to handle, and this is _still _hanging over my head." You scowled. "I am beginning to doubt how serious you are about delivering."

"Really?" She chuckled, leaning back in her chair languidly. "If you do not know whether you want someone dead or not, why did you come to me in the first place? Why hesitate now, after you have gone so far already? Guilt?"

You scowled, refusing to think about the things that haunted your nightmares, the terrible sights that played behind your eyes, every time you thought you were safe. "You don't need to know the reason. It's not something I will discuss with assassins," you said sharply. "I've told you that before, and I will say it again - you are just hired to do a job."

"Hired?" She shook her head. "Ah, silly man. You did not _hire_ me. The money is merely to weed out the undeserving, the destitute; the true price of my work is much, much steeper." She cocked her head to the side curiously. "You may have reconsidered your decision, of course - but some things cannot be retracted, some things must come to pass. I am not the one you made a deal with, Stane. That would be my boss, who thoroughly savors every kill."

You closed your eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. "Is that so? Consider our contract void, then. You will not get the rest of your money unless you deliver me the target's head before he returns from his little exile, and complicates everything further," you stated. "Is that clear?"

She merely laughed as she stood. "Descending to mere threats now, Obadiah? I think not. You came to me, little man… and you will reap the price. The price of pain." She turned slowly, sighing. "Rethink your decisions, next time, or the price will be steeper still. Good night."

It was a silent minute later, as you sat alone in the dark, that you slammed your hand down onto the board, flinging chess pieces everywhere. Only a white knight remained upright.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Arc 2 is currently ongoing, but I'll likely post the first part of it soon. Spider-Man and Iron Man team-up! New company plans!


	4. Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (1)

**Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (1 - 2)**

The first week back had been grueling. Long days in the pit, followed by meetings and appointments and worse things, until your schedule looked like a Christmas tree. You'd been utterly exhausted by the end of the first weekend, but you couldn't stop; you couldn't cycle down. Pepper was worried you were messing up your recovery from a second near-death experience, and Rhodey thought you'd come back too focused. Neither of them realized why you barely spoke to them for that time. You'd been inspired.

The next weeks were worse.

It wasn't the bomb; that was mundane. Given that you hadn't gotten to speak to more than two or three people at the conference before it went to hell, it was not exactly the influence of fellow genius blowhards, either. No - a single instant had crystallized, a momentary flash of that encounter with the assassin Deadpool.

Deadpool threw his hand around, gun at the ready, and fired with the precision that he'd shown on all the other people that had been shot - but he'd _missed_. The image of a mere reporter ducking a bullet and then smashing the hand that had delivered the shot. He'd slapped away someone who should have overpowered him by sheer size, let alone his Weapon Plus heritage, the brutal strength you'd felt at your throat.

Leaving aside the _why_, that moment called on the instinct that had been built up by twenty years of arms development, of designing planes, and bombs, and missiles. The arms race was in your blood, now, and escalation was a fact of life. You'd just been shown a target to aim for, someone who could flatten you with a single blow. Two people who were simply _better._

It was time to level the playing field.

"Jarvis," you spoke softly. "I'm flipping the switch, now. Hope you can hold on in there."

The AI bleeped once - the only form of communication he currently possessed. There was no real way to isolate a program so complicated and distributed as his; he was spread out across every computer in your home. Like the proverbial Ship of Theseus, then, there was only one way to make an upgrade. Piece by piece.

The final part - the most important part - was the central core, right at the heart of the building, nested neatly in the bedrock three stories below your feet. It had taken three days to lift the cluster out, on account of its sheer size, and nigh on twice as long to install the new mainframe, and setting it up as you required. It was always easier to destroy than to build, much to your chagrin.

"Seventy-seven percent complete," you recited, more to keep yourself busy than to ease whatever fears an artificial mind might have. Cut off from the majority of its functions, you imagined it was rather like Locked-In Syndrome for the bot, with a generous helping of sudden onset Alzheimer's. The only reason it wasn't a total cruelty was that you'd made sure Jarvis knew what was going on at all times. He'd agreed to this - brain surgery.

"How're you feeling, buddy? Everything okay? Eight-five percent done, now."

The AI bleeped once in affirmation.

The computer's upgrade had stalled most of your work in the house, but thankfully there had been other places to keep you busy, and to get some work done. You'd never bring your secret work to the company, on account of the weapon thefts, but everyone already knew about your work on arc reactors, and the version you were constructing wasn't particularly dangerous. Not anymore, at least.

You'd toyed with the idea of making a mass-production version of your arc reactor - but the consequences didn't take long to occur to you. The little device in your chest could put out several megawatts - enough to power some serious machinery. With that kind of unfettered power, even if Stark Industries didn't develop weapons based on it, someone else would. Roxxon or Hammer would have a prototype out within the year, and there'd be arc-fueled mass destruction the instant one of them screwed up. So - a change of plans.

Safety was what you'd programmed into the small arc reactors, and you already had confirmation that at least one functional arc reactor of a larger scale existed. As such, you'd taken apart the big one at the company - it had only been running one building for at least a decade. It had taken some days of design and a full week of tinkering, but you'd finally gotten that version rebuilt into something you recognized as modern. It wouldn't measure up to a freshly constructed one without the constraints of an existing design, but it would work.

Today, you were going to turn it on.

"Ninety-seven - last legs now, Jarvis." You turned to the screens behind you, all of them on but showing only darkness. Suddenly, with a burst of colorful flickering and static, they all turned bright white for a brief moment. "Ah, there we go."

"_I have been uploaded, sir,"_ Jarvis declared with what could only be relief, though you weren't sure if you were anthropomorphizing the emulated consciousness. You would've called Dr. Turing for a consultation, but alas…

"Right - excellent! Enjoying the new home, then?" You smiled at the screens as they slowly flipped to more familiar designs and lists of code. "It's at least four times as powerful as the last one, and it's got way, way more gadgets." You gestured vaguely behind you. "I installed another 3D-printer while I was at it, to complement the others. Finally some ceramics, I think."

"_Very good. I look forward to testing it later."_

"Yeah. Print me some - I dunno, replica Ming vases that I can break? Maybe some Space Shuttle tiles? Basically go for all the cool stuff and we'll figure out how to use it later." You stretched, yawning. "...Speaking of space shuttles, I'm gonna see if NASA called back yet. Without you to watch the phone, it's been ringing off the hook, but even with my persistence, they're keeping awfully silent…"

"_NASA, sir?"_ Jarvis inquired. _"Did they not ask you to stop calling, nine years ago?"_

"I was drunk that time," you defended. "How was I supposed to know she was the Director? I didn't even know feminism got to that level yet. I mean, sheesh, if there's anything that's a men's sport, it's watching giant Freudian symbols penetrating the virgin sky!"

"_I warned you."_

"And I was stupid not to listen to my teenage AI," you muttered. "Remember what you were like back then? Constantly tattling on me, incapable of understanding sarcasm? It took me months to cure you of that shortcoming, it was terrible."

"_I'm sure it was, sir. Incidentally, you have an appointment with the Board of Directors this evening. I also note that you have attended four of the last six - a statistical anomaly."_

You grimaced. "Pepper's making me do it?"

"_Yet I notice that Miss Potts is presently absent."_

You sighed. "Fine, smart-ass. _I'm_ making me do it. There's a - thing with the arc reactor that I'm working on, and I kind of need the board's help on this one. Or their approval, anyway. Obi's usually enough for this sort of thing, but if we're talking something with major impact…" You rubbed your forehead tiredly. "This is why I tend to upgrade, not innovate…"

"_If you do not leave within thirty minutes, you will be late."_

"How can I be late? I set this meeting myself," you muttered. "Alright - I'll handle this, and you get used to your new duds. If there's a problem, you are still attached to the primary backup, so you should be fine. You have the means to call me. Don't let Dum-E out of the lab - he's tried twice since the locks stopped working - and don't let in any strangers. Got it?"

"_I am able to attend to my duties, sir."_

"Great! Because I really don't know if I am." You turned, waving to the camera. "Off to make or break this oil-killing thing. Wish me luck!"

* * *

The company seemed downright spooky, with the power off - with the usual shift relocated to some of the side-buildings for a week, the main building looked foreboding in the gloom. The only lights were a few small spotlights you'd rigged up to the grid, illuminating the place just enough to give it a proper horror house vibe. Given that meetings tended to be around sundown, this was perfect. The darkness all around you was oddly soothing.

It was interesting that, even as you were at the company, preparing to show off a new variation on the arc reactor, your thoughts were on other things. It had been a month since the incident in Vegas, and Peter had never responded to your invitation - he'd left, and in the days thereafter you'd constantly expected him to show up at your doorstep. Instead, you got silence. The disappointment had largely been drowned in work, though.

The other consequence of that particular mess was involvement with S.H.I.E.L.D. - a subject that your dad's files had contained rather a lot of information about, even if most of it was couched in other terms. Usually they were just mentioned as 'my organization' and it was often hard to tell whether or not Stark Industries was referenced, or the spy club you'd so suddenly found out about.

It wasn't until well into the second week of work, when you'd been working on repulsors and your ideas about exoskeletons that you'd realized that Coulson, that friendly face that had visited you the first day, was only ever showing up when you were slacking off for a bit. For a moment, you wondered if you'd been bugged - but it had become quickly apparent that Jarvis had been the bug - or rather, the bot had voluntarily informed the agent when you were available. It seemed the AI actually liked Coulson.

If it weren't for the fact that you never messed with Jarvis's programming for fear of the possible consequences, you might've deleted that particular tendency.

"Well, everyone's late," you muttered to yourself. "Figures they would be, the one time that I set the time. How's that for revenge…"

"Tony."

You turned around rather quicker than you intended, the slight glow of your arc reactor shining through your clothes and illuminating the figure in front of you in eerie blue. You recognized that beard and shiny bald head anywhere, and sighed in relief. "Ah, Obi. I suppose this is why you don't turn off all the lights."

"You put lights up yourself, didn't you?" the man asked disbelievingly, clapping twice. The darkness receded from the clinical white that shone down. "What are you doing, hiding in the dark?"

"Thinking about the deepest questions in life, I assure you. Why are we here - where are we going - where's the pizza." You gestured to the arc reactor in the middle of the room, shrugging. "Will this thing work?"

"You didn't test it?" Obadiah demanded.

"Can't - not without either ruining the wiring, or the suspense. Probably the latter." You smirked. "But don't worry - I built one of these in a cave. I think I can handle it here, too."

Obadiah nodded slowly. "And you really think you can make this - clean energy thing happen? You've been all over this thing - far more than anything else in living memory, I'd say. Even the Jericho - and you were so proud of that one!"

"Well, that is a thing of beauty," you defended. "Anyway, this is bigger, better. None of the moral ambiguity or leftist hand-wringing, all of the awesome. I mean, there's a rather large difference between Merchant of Death and Clean Energy Revolutionary, isn't there? How about the headline 'Stark Industries solves Energy Crisis?' Sound good?"

"Sounds unbelievable."

"You think I'd voluntarily submit myself to half a dozen meetings of the Board of Directors over a failed experiment?" you asked rhetorically. "Look, I'm not a good CEO. I know that. I've accepted that despite my many skills, I have a bit of a respect problem, and I'm sure that nobody's surprised by that. However, I am a damn good engineer, and nobody would deny _that_."

Obadiah nodded, sighing. "We all know you're the golden goose, Tony. It's why nobody's jumped at getting you out of the position yet - you make us money. As long as the money keeps flowing…"

"You said 'yet',"you pointed out, narrowing your eyes. "Has anyone been talking?"

"Not since you came back."

"Vegas?" You asked. "What, they got scared of my failed attempts at strangling a guy?"

Obadiah shook his head. "Afghanistan. You made an impression, when you came back and handled the press and the board with finesse, despite your obvious… troubles." He frowned. "I stuck up for you, Tony - and thankfully you acted as I hoped you would. Maturely. I know it can be a problem for you."

You rolled your eyes. "Oh you, stop flattering me."

He frowned. "I'm serious, Tony. I know we haven't really talked, lately - but I am on your side. We together control the company - you have to remember that. But the board has rights, and given your actions before the kidnapping, can you blame them? You were leaving your duties aside, whoring it up with - "

"That was a one time thing, and I apologized," you argued. "...Alright, maybe a two or three time thing. But they forgave me. In writing."

"And refused a contract with SI," Obadiah said. "Tony - I'm not saying it's not an overreaction on the part of the board, but they have good reasons for their position. Make sure that you don't get any more of those reasons against you, and you'll be fine. Otherwise…" He grimaced, looking away. "Your Vegas adventure bought you some goodwill - even if the details are murky, the press mentioned your part in stopping the bomber. It makes you seem more - human - that you'd try to save a life. It's probably good that they don't realize the specifics."

"That's for sure," you agreed, thinking back to the confrontation with Deadpool, and its last few minutes, etched into your memory. "Fire and shards of glass are not exactly the friendliest of weapons, I admit."

Obadiah grunted in agreement. "Just keep the course, and hold yourself back from doing anything too troubling in the coming weeks or months. Meanwhile, I'll figure out a way to bring the company under tighter control, alright? That should give you some more leeway, and if you're right about reviving the arc reactor project - perhaps a lucrative thing to do, too."

"Hmm, how are you gonna do that?" You wondered aloud. "Buy them out? I've offered, you know, back when I first returned."

"And nobody believed you," Obadiah muttered. "You're rich - but you know what kind of contracts they signed, most of them dating back to your dad's era. Buying them all out would bankrupt you - if they were civil about it. Odds are they'll decide you're trying to kick them out because you're onto something big, and they'll hire big-time lawyers to stay in."

"Which means I'm stuck with them," you decided glumly. "Great."

"Take it this way - they are on the side of whoever makes them lots of money. If you do that, then you'll have the best allies around. And if that's not enough to settle your nerves, there's always me." He smiled thinly, though he looked haggard in the pale light. "You have to realize, Tony - as long as I'm around, they can't hurt you. Not really."

You tapped his arm, smiling. "I suppose that's something I ought to remember."

"Hm. I know I haven't always trusted you as I did your father - but I should have. Sooner or later, you always make the right call." He glanced at the big arc reactor, shrugging. "We're ironmongers, we make weapons, Tony. I always figured this big old thing was a waste of time and resources. If you can change all that, if you can move beyond the box you've been living in for the last decades, then maybe you're right about the rest of it, too. About all those dreams you have, or had." He looked away. "Maybe."

You frowned at the man's odd mood. It seemed almost - melancholic. "Obi? Is something wrong? You seem..."

Obadiah looked back, shaking his head. "No. It's - nothing. Well - actually, it's personal." He refused to meet your gaze. "Look, Tony, I know I can trust you. Probably now more than ever." He slipped a hand into his pocket. "You're a good kid, and I'd hate to see anything happen to you."

"What…?"

Your old mentor pulled out a cylindrical device, staring at it for a long moment. "You know that at some point in our lives, we all run into our past mistakes. You've been face to face with a few of yours lately, I would say. And I have run into some of mine." He looked up again, and raised the device. "I want you to have this."

You took the object, and only then did you realize what it was. "...What's on it?"

Obadiah raised his eyebrows as he crossed his arms. "Information. That flash drive contains all of my secrets - everything I might have hidden from you, everything your father might have conveniently omitted. It's locked tighter than Fort Knox, though, with one of the encryption algorithms that your father invented. The only one who knows how to get in these days is me." He rubbed his brow tiredly. "It also contains everything you need to know to take control of my share of the company."

You stared at him in incomprehension. "Why?"

"It's - insurance, Tony. Keep that somewhere safe - and if everything goes well, you'll never have to use it. If anything were to happen, though, I'll make sure that the key gets to you." He narrowed his eyes. "It's a precaution - I'm not going to drop dead, Tony. But after what you've been through recently, I really can't be too careful."

"...You're not telling me everything."

"Oh, no, I'm not." Obadiah smiled, then. "I rescheduled our meeting, by the way. The half hour I bought us is nearly over. You'd better get ready."

"_You_ did that?" You wondered for a moment. "Wait - Obi…"

The man turned to face you, but said nothing more - and the arrival of one of the other directors prevented any further discussion. You turned the flash drive in your hand, looking after Obadiah with narrowed eyes as you slipped it into a pocket. It was clear that he wasn't going to say more - but you were going to try and break that encryption. Of course you were.

* * *

"Presto! Eureka! Insert meaningful quote here, history books!" you exclaimed as you flipped the last switch, and with a slow groaning noise and a flash of artificial lightning skittering across the inside of the protective enclosure, white-hot plasma burst into existence, a glowing coil of energy that quickly suffused the reactor. It already looked far more impressive than the previous version, and it hadn't even been dialed to full yet. You didn't intend to try that until the next week.

"Over fifty megawatts of power, if we dial it up," you said clearly. "Enough to run a small town from one of these babies - and at a fraction of current asking price. We might be able to undercut existing prices by as much as two-thirds - and that's including the investment costs for building the reactors in the first place."

"That's -"

"Insane? Impossible?" You gestured to the reactor, smiling. "Tell that to the humming wonder there. Even if you had to build a new one every year or two, you'd still come out on top while reducing the price of power by more than half - and I don't see other energy companies jumping into that pool. Given that it's clean energy on top, and thus gets all the tax benefits of that…"

You didn't know if the directors were slack-jawed from awe or greed, but at the moment it really didn't matter. The fact that they were all focused on the bright blue glow was telling enough.

"I am proposing that we built pilot reactors in each of our locations - here, in all our facilities up the west coast, and a few in the heartland, though those are lower-priority until we have enough built. When that's done - we're going to offer the excess power to the immediate neighborhoods, in much the same way that other clean energies get that done."

"And next thing you know, they'll want _more_," a certain Mr. Klein said, a graying man that'd been around since time immemorial. "This is good - this is something we can work with!"

A second person cleared her throat - the venerable Mrs. Beaumont. "This is - interesting, Mr. Stark, but you have yet to mention selling this technology to our primary partners. While supplying our own company with cheap power is commendable, it seems rather small pickings compared to the profits that could be made."

You nodded, shaking your head. "I assume by primary partners you are euphemistically referring to our military connection. I also trust you have realized that Mr. Rhodes is _not_ with us right now - and as such, I am not at present considering selling this to _anyone_." You met Beaumont's eyes and smiled. "This will remain in-house for as long as I deem it necessary - and that's final. If this gets into the wrong hands before we secure it, we might lose a lot more than a few bucks of profit. Besides, the civil market is broad enough that it shouldn't matter in a few months."

"...is there something wrong with our army contracts?" Klein inquired. "You have never objected to their bids before."

"This is a clean energy project, people," you said slowly. "Clean. Energy. You know what would be the greatest way to completely kill off enthusiasm from the left and environmentalists? Turning their greatest hope, even if they don't know it yet, into the new _nuke_. This has to be a blank slate project - because our name alone is enough to make people wonder. We can't afford to add to that paranoia."

Obadiah cleared his throat, then. "Actually, Tony, you could consider founding a sister company, for the PR-friendly stuff like this. Keep SI for the military contracts that the public's iffy about anyway, and shunt the humanitarian efforts to something new. Something without a history. You have the people to make that happen, and the profits would ultimately end up in the same pot, so nobody would go broke over it."

That was - actually not a bad idea. Something new - founded by Tony Stark, not Howard. Something that could delve into all the crazy directions you'd thought about - exoskeletons and repulsors, spaceflight and clean energy. Building the future.

"...That's worth considering," you allowed at last. For one, you would have much less oversight from the board of directors - since technically, they're not in charge. It'd just be you, and whoever else would help you set it up. Pepper, maybe. Rhodey. "I'll get back to you on that."

"I'll sketch up some proposals," Obadiah offered. "Katherine - you can arrange the logistics of getting a bunch of reactors shipped off the instant they're done. Knowing Tony, he'll have the factories ready to make the things within weeks."

"Actually, the one downstairs already can," you said easily. "Robots, you know - they can build it, even if nobody around here knows how the things work. That's a thing of beauty, I'd say. They're pretty much magic." You smirked. "Clarke was completely right."

Right then, the tones of '_Thunderstruck'_ erupted from the side of your jacket, and you sighed. You flipped open your phone to general muttering, and a small holographic display popped up. It was an unknown number - traced by Jarvis to New York. It was coming from the Daily Bugle building.

"Can you guys hold on a minute, here?" You asked, repressing the smile that was threatening to take over. "I have to take this."

* * *

The sky was perfectly clear as you closed your eyes against the sun, the comfortable heat of the summer a welcome diversion from the climate-controlled frigid temperature of the server rooms. The garage was clammy even with the best in ventilation, and the air turned stale from recycling. There were a few of these days every year, when even your luxurious accommodation could get a bit stinky, and usually you spent those days ignoring everything and visiting lots of clubs. This year was an exception.

It was strange, now that you thought about it, that you hadn't been to a single party since your return from Vegas, or even Afghanistan. The medical excuse was a part of that, of course, but the truth was that you hadn't even felt like picking up some one-night-stand or a bottle of hard liquor. Both of those, you'd found, were symptoms of _boredom,_and that hadn't been much of a problem of late - you'd been filled to the brim with ideas, and just started building, straight through the night.

Nothing to get the creativity juices flowing like terrorists and the threat of imminent death, you supposed. It couldn't be anything _benign, _of course...

"Jarvis - how far along is that mesh, now?" you inquired lazily, as your phone was next to you, baking in the sun and probably overheating. "How about the rest of the stuff?"

"_Completion of the composite mesh is at eighty-one percent, sir. Estimated completion time is in two hours. Ceramic tiles are ready for embedding."_

Two more hours of relaxation - honestly, you'd almost forgotten what it was like to have time off like this, or at least to actually use it. Even though you set your own hours, and your schedule was relatively light, you hadn't really been able to stop and smell the roses for a while - not since you'd caught that brainwave after Vegas. On multiple occasions you'd belatedly realized that you were missing a whole day, and that despite Jarvis's prodding you had worked through the night and into the next morning. Brilliant.

It was right then that the blissful silence was broken, and you jerked in surprise.

"Tony? Are you on the _roof?_" Pepper called again, mystified. "What on earth are you thinking? Hold on, I'm coming up there."

You groaned as you slumped onto your back, staring into the air. You knew that somewhere in the bowels of your home, disassembled into pieces but ready for a test, you had the means to get up into that sky and _fly. _You dearly wished to take out that hunk of metal, but a distant worry prevented you; with assassins and spies on your case, revealing your hand would be a terribly tactic. Perhaps you could take it out under cover of night, but no sooner than that. Right now, it was your little secret.

It was a minute or two later that Pepper clambered onto the flat deck of the house, frowning as she noticed you with your hands behind your head, sweat pooling in your clothes as you _basked_. "...What are you doing?"

"I'm photosynthesizing." You yawned widely. "Want to join me?"

"No, I don't want - Tony, you do realize you had two appointments this afternoon?" Pepper asked irritably. "I've been looking for you for half an hour, but Jarvis wouldn't tell me where you were!"

"Good boy," you murmured, smiling to yourself. Jarvis had been quite obedient the last few days - more than likely a sort of strange repayment for the upgrade you'd given him. Either that, or you'd accidentally dialed the sarcasm down a little. You'd figure out which later. "Pepper, I haven't missed anything. I rescheduled."

"..._You_did?" Pepper asked. "You do realize I'm your secretary?"

"Yeah… and I also realized that you weren't _here,_" you pointed out dryly as you dragged yourself to a sitting position. "The Roxxon guys - I just outright cancelled that one. Not interested in their crap - they're just trying to figure out what I'm working on. The other guy's been tossed to Wednesday on account of my… health. I figured he'd buy that."

"You rescheduled because of the weather?" Pepper inquired disbelievingly.

You shook your head. "Nah - I'm expecting a few people over, didn't want to clog up the schedule today on account of that. They're way more interesting than some bozos that probably hadn't written up a contract yet, anyway." You shrugged. "Rhodey's due soon."

Pepper frowned. "You cancelled meetings because you wanted to get a drink with _James_?" She groaned as she tapped something into her phone. "That's so - so _you._You don't have the numbers of the people you snubbed, by any chance? So I can go apologize for your rudeness, as usual?"

"Peter's coming over too," you added lightly, and she stiffened. You nodded. "Yeah, the one that helped save your life, in case you forgot. He called two days ago, asked me if he could take me up on an invitation I gave him. I figured that I might as well have him drop by the house. Bit stuffy inside, but we'll manage in the evening, I think."

"I'm sure." Pepper sighed. "Well, I guess it's a good thing that you're making friends. Sort of. Not sure how I feel about you finding some kindred spirit in someone young enough to be your own kid, but I suppose you might have some latent -" She stopped, shaking her head.

"If you're going to say _daddy issues_, I'm tossing you off this roof," you muttered. "I was thinking of offering the guy a job, actually. Seems like he could use it - and I have a feeling that someone not born in the lap of luxury might appreciate a little cash. Hell, if nothing else he could take over your duties with the press. I know you have a - dislike for that stuff."

"That's silly, and you know -" She paused, staring at your chest. "_What is that?_" Pepper asked, staring with wide eyes.

It took you a few moments to follow her gaze and realize that she was talking about your arc reactor - or rather, what was attached to it. Surrounding the glowing circle were a dozen little wires, mostly hidden by your paper-thin shirt, running down one sleeve. "...You've seen the arc reactor before, genius."

"The wires - it's…"

"Ah - that." You faltered, slipping up your sleeve a little to reveal a small metal device strapped to your arm, just out of sight. You hadn't really finished the thing, since it was still far too visible against your skin, but the basics were there. "This is just a precaution."

"There's _wires _sticking out of your _heart,_" Pepper pressed, aghast. "Isn't that thing keeping you alive? Why would you risk your _life_like this?"

"I'm not experimenting," you protested. "The reactor generates enough power to run this entire house and I still wouldn't notice. I'm just siphoning off a _little _of it." You grasped the device hidden in your clothes and stretched out your arm, revealing a long tangled wire, with a tiny round device at the end, which slipped effortlessly between your fingers. "This little thing here? It's a micro-repulsor. It's something I've been working on since - well, two days ago, actually. It's for self-defense."

"You built a weapon into yourself?" Pepper asked, staring. "...Other people would buy a gun if they were feeling insecure. I know I did."

"You have a _gun_?" you asked, distracted. "Eh, I suppose I can see that. You'd better have requisitioned it from the company, though - we're made of the things." You tapped the repulsor. "This, though, is something else. It's a hundred times weaker than the real thing because it's supported only by my arm, and I'd rather not shatter that, but it works. It's still got quite a bit of oomph." You aimed straight up, and squeezed slightly. A burst of bright white light burst forth for a split second, a narrow-beamed surge of energy that dissipated almost instantly. "It's got the stopping power of a shotgun, and could be lethal with good aim…"

Pepper nodded slowly. "This is because of Las Vegas," she said after a long while. "Isn't it?"

"Yes. We nearly died, Pepper." You looked away. "I've got a new vest in construction downstairs, and it's far better than Kevlar. I'll make you and Rhodey some too, I've got enough material for that. I also made the mother of all cattle-prods, but I haven't really figured out how to hide it. There's a few other odds and ends that I've been working on, too." You met her eyes again tiredly. "If anything happens in the future, I'll be prepared."

"Tony…" Pepper grasped your hand, smiling thinly. "I should have known this would be your solution to things. Not talk it out, not some kind of therapy - you shut yourself into your basement and build a fix. But you should see people more. The wrench isn't the solution to _every _problem."

"Just most of them," you said with emphasis. "If you cast a wide enough net, everything's within my purview." You stood up, putting the repulsor back near your armpit, and the tiny device hummed softly. Thankfully, it could not be activated accidentally, or you'd never have risked it there. "In my view, everything's an engineer's job, when you boil it down to basics. Self-protection, generation of energy, transportation, navigating space - with a good budget and some hard work, even the promotion of health… and good old immortality."

Pepper looked decidedly unimpressed. "Okay, _that _was bravado speaking. How many bottles did you drink before you had the bright idea to get up here?"

"One?" you proposed. "It was a big one. A celebration, sort of."

"Celebration of _what, _exactly_?"_

You smiled, thinking of the gleaming silvery exoskeleton downstairs, finally completed. "Just - something I've been working on. You'll find out eventually, as always."

* * *

By the time Rhodey arrived, you'd gotten down from the roof, and at Pepper's urging you'd retreated to the open deck behind the house, which looked out over the ocean. A bottle of something delicious - you weren't sure how to classify it, except that it was alcoholic - was open besides you, and Pepper had reluctantly brought you a few sandwiches to fill your rumbling stomach. Life was good.

You felt utterly _safe_, and it wasn't long before you realized how strange that was. Everyone with a proper phone book or half a second interest in the news would know exactly what your place looked like, and where to find it - it was only ever-vigilant Jarvis that kept you from being surprised by new arrivals. On top of that, S.H.I.E.L.D. was keeping an eye out, and you were pretty sure they were trouble, despite good intentions_._Perhaps the reason you felt safe was because this house had been designed by you, in a more creative episode - it was a suit of armor in its own way.

The little television next to you was old, tiny and had rather poor reception from inside, but it was a keepsake from another time, one of the very first devices you'd built with only your own two hands. Though hopelessly outdated, it was still a fond memory, and you were in a strange mood. As usual, Jarvis was monitoring the channels for any mentions of you - just in case. You'd been catching up on a month of unwatched streams.

"_-billionaire Tony Stark, eccentric CEO of Stark Industries has been a rare sight in recent weeks, after his brush with death at a conference in Las Vegas, when a terrorist threat detonated a bomb, and Stark reportedly distracted the perpetrator until he could be taken down by law enforcement. Following shortly after his kidnapping in Afghanistan, some have questioned whether Stark is suffering from PTSD and is therefore off the screens, though inside sources report that the CEO has been unusually active in recent weeks."_

"I suppose they would catch on eventually," you murmured.

"_An official press-release from Stark Industries Board of Directors member Obadiah Stane confirms that last week's blackout, widely reported as a power failure, was in fact a scheduled experiment, and all power was restored within several hours, with personnel minimally affected. Though details on the experiments are scarce, insiders claim that it was part of Stark Industries' attempts to go 'green', switching entirely to alternative fuels.'_

"You can join me, you know," you said aloud, banking on Rhodey being close enough to hear. Jarvis had warned you minutes earlier that he was approaching, and you'd been expecting his head to pop up for a while. "You don't have to be shy. Besides, I'm just indulging my narcissism, it's nothing bad."

"I'm not hiding," Rhodey said from directly behind you, and you smiled. "And you are drunk."

"Nah. I have too much experience with this stuff to be that far gone already," you protested weakly. "I'm - mildly inebriated. And you know that unless I get really sloshed…"

Rhodey rubbed his forehead tiredly. "Yeah, yeah, high-functioning alcoholic, I've heard it all before," he muttered irritably as he stepped into view wearing something that seemed unusually casual; nothing like the military duds he seemed to like so much. "You wanted to see me, right?"

"Yeah, yeah. Go, sit." You gestured to the next chair. "Pepper's off somewhere, she won't mind. She'll get you a beer soon enough. The bottle is mine. You can't have it." You gestured to the television next to you. "I'm almost up to date, now."

"_An anonymous source confirms that the recent outage at Stark Industries was related to a green energy experiment, and let slip that it was successful. Stocks, which have been fluctuating in recent weeks due to uncertainties regarding the state of its CEO, have calmed somewhat in recent days, with a slight upwards trend."_

"Obi, you little scoundrel…" you muttered, shaking your head as you turned off the television.

"He's just looking out for the good of the company," Rhodey said. "It seems like you haven't tanked the stocks with your little gambit, either. Well done," he added dryly as he sat down on the chair next to yours. "I actually expected you downstairs, you know. The last three times I was here, you barely even responded to me."

"I was _busy_," you defended. "I'm trying to get some traction with the company, and a few ideas came to me that needed some attention. The whole social thing sort of fell by the wayside." You frowned. "It's like the clock turned back to my teenage years, it's _weird. _Anyway, you're here now, and I'm soaking in some good old skin cancer rays, so I guess we can discuss the big problems."

Rhodey shrugged as he leaned back in the chair. "I've been busy with that little doozy you put me on, in between shifts. I should mention that the army wasn't very happy with my research. They tolerated me poking around for a while, but I have a feeling I might have offended some people." He frowned. "I came across quite a few problems, but I left most of them aside since they weren't really serious. I still ended up getting investigated after I looked up people that the CIA is after, though."

"That doesn't sound too good," you said slowly. "Any of them have familiar names?"

He shook his head. "I was trying to track down who was responsible for the missing shipments, but it seems that the logs were pretty thoroughly cleansed. I managed to get some basic info on which ships were used, but they've got rotating crews and it's hard to pinpoint who is responsible when the data's been compromised like this. When I tried to cross-reference some of the supposed people on those ships..."

"Fake names drawn from some nasty registry or another?" You nodded as you considered that. "Jarvis can't help with tracking down who edited this stuff, and when? I've just upgraded him, he's eager to please."

Rhodey grimaced. "I doubt it. The data's been stripped clean - the only reason we even know something's missing is that the weapons are appearing on the black market. All I could really find was that whoever did this has some _serious _access to internal files on the Stark servers, and a bad sense of humor."

"To get access to our internal files, you need permission. The only people who can just freely access everything are myself, and - _Obi_?" You paused, thinking of the little flash drive that you'd stashed downstairs, the one that a flustered Obadiah had given you as a fail-safe. "That's ludicrous. More than likely someone hacked into the system."

Despite your words, a chill ran down your back. Obadiah had entrusted you with important information, and you were sure he had a good reason for that. You seriously doubted that someone who was guilty of stealing would entrust you with something important, but there were other possibilities. What if it had been Obi's access codes that were compromised, and he had found out about it? If he'd made himself a target by uncovering the thieves, it was no wonder he'd want to stash the truth somewhere safe. And who would he pick but the one person who could actually _use _the information he had discovered?

"Hey, Jarvis?" you asked slowly. "I'm having a hunch here. Use your new hacking tools, and check whether Obi is still in the system at SI." You frowned. "You can't afford anyone noticing that the files have been accessed, in case the leak is watching, so be careful."

"Tony, what are you saying…?" Rhodey asked, mystified. "You don't really believe that Mr. Stane would -"

Jarvis piped up. _"There is an anomaly, sir. The account in question was deleted seventeen hours ago via local access, from Mr. Stane's personal computer."_

"Obadiah did that. He's locking himself out," you observed. "I think he knows he's been compromised, but he doesn't want to lead whoever is responsible to me, in case the leak notices. He talked to me while the power is off so he could make sure nobody was listening in." You frowned. "Why would he do that, if the Vegas episode already showed that they were after me? Unless that wasn't a part of it… In which case S.H.I.E.L.D.'s off the friends list too..."

"Tony?"

You shook your head. "Jarvis - dial up Obadiah, and tell me the moment you have him on the line. If he doesn't answer, check in on anyone else around to figure out where he was last seen. I think he's in trouble."

Rhodey grabbed his own phone from his pocket, offering it to you. "You can just call him yourself, can't you?"

You stared at the device. "If you've been looking into this as deeply as you say, your phone's probably bugged already," you remarked dryly. "WiFi is on. Jarvis, check Rhodey's phone while you're at it, look for any listening software. You should have more than enough parallel processing to do that, now."

"_Of course, sir." _The AI sounded downright smug. _"There is indeed malware on Mr. Rhodes' phone, as you suspected," _he continued immediately. _"There are noticeable traces, however they do not resemble any common program. In fact, the code is nearly 85% identical to the link-up code that I myself employ. Tracing back to previous versions in the database, it is 97% identical to last November's revision."_

"Sonofabitch," you mouthed, aghast. "Someone _pirated _you, Jarvis?"

"_Only a fraction. The most likely scenario is that someone took possession of a phone with my code installed, and edited it for their own purposes,_" Jarvis noted. "_Security protocols that should have prevented my program from working were removed - this implies access to advanced cryptographic decoders and considerable ingenuity."_

"That means someone smart did this. Someone _you-_smart," Rhodey observed darkly. "Does the company have any enemies who can do that? Do _you?_"

You nodded. "Every competitor that's worth a damn has some eggheads around to do the dirty work," you observed morosely. "Thing is, they've seriously stepped up the extremism from corporate espionage if it's any of them. Because someone's hired a world-class hacker to keep the smuggling operation a secret, an assassin from Weapon Plus to send a message, _and _some good old-fashioned terrorist from the middle-east, if we assume S.H.I.E.L.D.'s right about that. Anyone wanna panic yet?"

"What do we do?" Rhodey demanded.

"As long as Obi's not answering his phone, we can't do jack," you said. "I have no idea where I'd even start looking for him if he's not at the company or at home - he's slippery when he wants to be. Judging from Jarvis's silence on the topic, odds are he's in the wind. And given that the people after him were already listening in on _your _calls, Rhodey, I think it's smart that you don't go anywhere dark and lonely either in the foreseeable future."

"What do you mean?"

You shrugged lightly. "What can I say? You can crash on my couch if you wish."

Rhodey started. "You want me to stay _here_?"

"Well, yeah. Unless you want to get blown up?" you asked dryly, as you sipped at your drink. "Panicking won't do us any good, and I'm prepared for a lot of things. If you want to head home, I'll call a friend of mine to escort you, and have his people stake out your place. Just in case." You thought of Coulson, and smiled. "I have a feeling that they're more interested in keeping me safe than telling the truth, but that's not a problem right now."

"You want me to sit on my ass?" Rhodey demanded. "Do nothing?"

You narrowed your eyes. "No, I think not. Get yourself some good guns - and expect a call. I have a feeling that the moment Jarvis finds a sign of Obi's whereabouts, we'll need to roll out. Be ready for that."

Rhodey looked at you with a strange expression for a few long moments, then nodded sharply. "You're going to do this one vigilante-style? Don't want to get the armed forces into it? You're not exactly..."

"You're mistaken. I _am _the armed forces," you murmured. "Go. The moment I hear anything, this is going down."

* * *

"So, exactly _how _old are you?" you asked as you tweaked the arc reactor you'd been fiddling with for the last hour with a tiny wrench - hopefully, it would one day be a fitting replacement for the one in your chest. You were mostly fiddling with it to distract yourself from thinking about the possibility that Obi was hurt, even as Jarvis continued to search for him. Rhodey had headed home after all, but he kept in regular contact. So that left you alone. Excellent. "Well, gonna answer?"

"Um… Seventeen. ...Seventeen-ish. Not sure why you wanna know," Peter said slowly, staring at the glowing blue device. "You do realize that thing's really dangerous, right? Like, it's actually _glowing._"

"Well, _yeah_. It's several megawatts of concentrated power that's contained within a device barely bigger than my fist. I could be holding a grenade, and you'd be _less _observant," you said with a roll of your eyes. "Lucky for you, I removed the proverbial firing pin. If I do something really awful, it could destabilize, but it'll fizzle before anything more that happens. Would give me a nasty burn, but nothing more."

"As long as you're careful," he said blandly. "Not a big fan of grenades, myself. Or guns."

"You're from New York," you murmured. "I excuse your liberal values on account of that. And in any case, I don't _love _guns. I just really appreciate not having enemies, and guns are a great way to make that happen." You picked up the arc reactor, and smiled. "This thing can take a hell of a beating, though. Catch!"

You didn't toss the thing underhanded - with a swing that wouldn't have looked out of place on a baseball field you launched it at Peter, crossing the distance in a fraction of a second. In that same time, the boy's hand shot up and grasped the device tightly, suspending it an inch in front of his face. He hadn't had any warning - it had just _happened._

"Beautiful catch," you crooned as you smiled. "Could not have done it better myself. Seriously - my nervous system is slow as molasses compared to yours."

Peter's expression shifted for a second to something like shock, before it smoothed over again into boredom - so quick that it seemed downright automatic, and you might not have noticed at all if you hadn't expected it. "That's because you're old as dirt," the boy quipped, and you had to give him props for the effortless recovery.

"I'm _older _than you, not _old,_" you argued. You narrowed your eyes for a moment, nodding to yourself. "I'm guessing that there's some story behind your sudden visit, right? I mean, I know I left that invitation open, but I'd sort of written it off as a no-show…"

"Someone… told me to visit you," Peter said after a long moment, looking away.

"_Someone,"_you repeated with emphasis. "And you can't tell me who?"

Peter shrugged. "He said you two already met, and I figure he likes his privacy. Anyway, that wasn't really all of the reason. It's - I figured since you're a big competitor, you'd know a thing or two about Oscorp…"

You pulled a face. "Unfortunately, yeah."

"Yes, well, I don't exactly like them much either," Peter admitted. "They've been doing some shady stuff, and I'm sort-of friends with the son of the CEO, Harry. He's been - giving off some freaky vibes lately, and the company's suspicious to begin with. So, I'm thinking…"

"In case you haven't noticed, my company and Oscorp don't really get along," you said dryly. "What do you propose I do about those - _freaky vibes? _I can't exactly fly over there and tap Norman on his fingers without getting a bunch of blowhards complaining…"

Peter shrugged, and it seemed like a very genuine gesture. "I don't know - but I thought that if anyone would know what that creep is doing behind closed doors…" He shook his head. "I really did want to take up your invitation back then, but I couldn't hang around while my aunt thought I was hurt. The news did make it look much worse than it was."

You nodded slowly, narrowing your eyes. There clearly was more to the reason why Peter came to you than just some vague Oscorp-related suspicions, or the word of some unnamed stranger. He probably wasn't looking for a job - just trying to figure out what to do about his troubles. Given what you'd deduced about him, he probably had a lot that kept him awake.

"...Follow me down, would you? I've got something to show you." You stood and walked to the glass door that led to the staircase. "Leave your bags and whatever here - nobody photographs the secret stuff. Jarvis, open up the garage for us."

"_Sir, you instructed me not to let anyone-"_

"You heard me."

Peter looked around curiously as he descended down to the basement behind you, glancing over the various half-assembled gadgets that lay spread around the rooms. "You know, back in NY they would've put some serious questions at being asked to follow some older man into the basement. Bad connotations and all that…"

"Yeah, don't start with that," you said quickly. "Come on, the magic's back here. And yes, I know that put in the wrong context, this is all horrible. Now shut up and watch me be awesome." You turned on a dime, positioning yourself over an unassuming white spot on the floor. "Get on it, Jarvis. Make it flashy. No buts."

"_Of course, sir," _Jarvis said in a long-suffering tone.

"What are you talking about?" Peter asked, but he paused as the sound of a Metallica song poured from the speakers, and with a groaning noise, something below his feet _shifted._You glanced down just in time to see the floor shift aside.

"This is the really cool part," you said with a wide smile, as dozens of electronic arms darted from the floor, unfolding and transforming smoothly as they brought dozens of pieces of metal and electronics into view. You barely had to move your feet to slip into metal boots that fit perfectly, shaped to match your physique. The assembly of the legs and arms was fast, and Jarvis seemed especially eager to show off, twisting and turning parts more for effect than any practical purpose. The torso attached solidly, and the helm was last to arrive, closing with a solid thunk over your face - and then there was darkness.

An instant later the world flooded in again, as internal holographic systems blinked on. A high-quality image of the outside world projected itself in front of your eyes, and a UI seamlessly slid over it, following the movement of your eyes and listing diagnostics before you'd even asked for them. The slack-jawed expression on Peter's face was instantly photographed and saved, and bio-metric readings started soon thereafter. As expected, they were a little _odd._That figured.

"You built functional battle armor?" Peter asked as he stared at the suit. Though current unarmed beyond repulsors, it looked quite fearsome. This was only the third time you'd put on the suit; the first time with anyone else present. "Okay, that - that is so freaking _badass! _I can't believe how cool that is!_"_

"Ah, you haven't seen the coolest bit!" you declared, and the face plate opened up, revealing your sweaty face. "Jarvis - close the blast doors beneath me."

"_Sir -"_

"You're questioning my orders again. Obedience didn't last long," you responded, and reluctantly the doors beneath you shifted closed, covering the delicate machinery beneath. "Peter - take a step back, would you? This is gonna be loud."

"I - of course." He hastened to the wall, still wide-eyed.

With a single brief burst of energy and a cacophony of raging noise, the entire suit lifted off the ground an inch, then two - the multi-ton metal exoskeleton balanced on the exhaust of four repulsors. It was hovering more than anything, of course - but the message was loud and clear. Yeah - you could fly.

"_I want one!"_ Peter shouted with absolute certainty over the roaring of the boot jets. "Can I have one? _Please_?"

The repulsors shut down with a hiss, and you dropped down half a feet, landing with a fantastic clang that came very close to leaving a dent, aside from the burn scars you'd already left. "Do you have seven-hundred million dollars?" you asked rhetorically. "This thing's for personal use. I've been planning to test it out, but it's been hectic. This thing is my answer to some of the stranger things that have been in the news lately. You should know."

"...I should?" the boy asked with a convincing clueless expression.

"New York, right? Lots of crazy there." Well, time to dive in, then. "I figured, since you go out to beat people up in blue-and-red pajamas..." You stretched your arms, ready to put the suit away until you could actually try it outside, and Jarvis's arms appeared just as Peter stumbled in surprise. "What? Was it something I said?"

Peter stared, aghast. "...What?"

"I think your costume looks pretty cool, though I'd go with more hot-rod red myself," you said easily, amused at the boy's perplexed look. "Hey, don't look so _shocked_. You kind of gave yourself away last time we met," you explained. "You're Spider-Man, aren't you? Who'd have thought. No, seriously, who would have? You're like - some kid."

Peter stared at you like you'd grown horns. It hadn't actually been that hard to connect the dots; between your observation of Peter's superhuman strength and agility, his annoyance with his current employer's fixation with the local super-freak, and press descriptions of the masked vigilante with superhuman powers, it was honestly sort of cheating. When you'd seen the first pictures in which some hair was visible, that pretty much clinched it. The boy really had to learn to keep his mask on straight.

"You remember Deadpool? That asshole in Vegas?" You smiled at Peter's silence, as the armor was folded away from your arms. "He was involved in Weapon Plus experiments. A reject Captain America, if you will. That man had enough muscle in those pile-drivers of his to bench press a car, and you disarmed him with a _slap. _Not exactly subtle, though I really appreciate the assist."

"Ah, crap," Peter mouthed, glancing towards the exit. He looked like he was about ready to run, and the awkwardness that he'd feigned before vanished.

"_Relax_ - I'm the only one who knows about this," you explained as Jarvis removed the final parts of your suit, and you stepped forward, arms raised. "The security cameras caught everything, but I deleted those files before anyone could check them. Pepper never even saw what you did, and Pym was in no position to see much of anything. That leaves Deadpool - who was shot in the head, if you recall, by the guy who arrived last. You're safe."

"So _this _is that why you invited me?" Peter demanded, then, looking suddenly more forward, and you were all too aware that his unassuming physique hit a _lot _of power. "So all of it wasn't about what you said, was it? Offering me a job and such? You just wanted to _out_ me?"

"Yeah, I was totally gonna give you up to the press - in my basement_,_" you observed, mystified. "I was truthful about the job thing_._The superhuman stuff - well, I thought that would come up at some point." You gestured behind you to the disassembled armor that was vanishing back into the floor. "I'm hard at work on self-improvement as you can tell, so I'm not criticizing you for whatever crazy thing you did to yourself. I hear you do good work in the Big Apple, with your - gifts. All kinds of heroism, right?"

"...Yeah," Peter said lamely. "So, you're _not _going to rat me out?"

You smiled. "Not unless you're up for that, no. But I'll toss a bonus on your salary to make up for the scare," you said simply. "Besides, you know some of my secrets, now. It evens out, don't you think?" You walked to your workbench, tapping the drawings that were spread out there. "Here, check out some of my plans… I've been drawing up cool ideas. Figured you might be interested."

"...Are you designing spaceships?" Peter inquired, still staring at you strangely as he looked over the whiteboards. "Is that a - you don't think small, do you?"

"Well, you got powers, and you use them to make the world a better place," you said easily. "I've been working in the same direction. I kind of pulled away from the weapons thing, and have been focusing on energy lately." You tapped the arc reactor in your chest. "This thing's one of my creations, and it's promising to be an important one. I've been working on shifting Stark Industries production towards peaceful applications like the arc reactor. That was where I figured you might fit."

"I admit, the military stuff doesn't really appeal to me," Peter agreed. "Hold on, now," he said, frowning. "This is all... You know who I am. What I _do_. And you're - fine with that? Skipping on to some other subject? I figured this is kind of a big deal here! Spider-Man, all that?"

You shrugged. "Until I researched this stuff, I'd barely even heardof Spider-Man - you are a local legend, I'm sure, but national news barely covers your exploits. Bummer." You narrowed your eyes. "Who knows, maybe that can change? With your kind of abilities, you shouldn't be locked into punching small-time crooks and such, that's what regular police are for. You should be out there doing big things, making a difference."

"Believe me, we have plenty of irregular crooks in the city," Peter complained. "There's this guy who has a giant rhino suit - seriously, don't ask. Also an old guy, geriatric, who goes around doing vampire stuff while wearing a bird costume. It's _weird. _Oh, and I haven't even gotten to the _actual _vampire!"

"Sounds… interesting." You smiled. "I've read a few bits and pieces of that stuff - I'm guessing someone's been working pretty hard to shove most of it under the carpet, even if the Daily Bugle harps on about it. I've got a few likely suspects." You shrugged. "Anyway, I am totally cool with the web slinging. Kind of jealous, actually. I'm offering money and freedom, and I'll throw in great dental. What do you say?"

"...I have a family. Back in New York," Peter said. "I can't just - leave."

You smirked. "Then don't. I've got a few ideas on how to solve that. Who knows, maybe it's time to bring the fight to Oscorp's hunting grounds?"

Peter shook his head. "...You're so weird_._"

"I'm rich - it's called _eccentric." _You paused. "By the way, how _does _that webbing of yours work? Inquiring geniuses want to know."

"Well…" Peter fumbled with his sleeves. "It's..."

Jarvis spoke up, then. _"Sir - I have just received confirmation of Mr. Stane's last known location. He was spotted at a harbor downtown, in the company of several unknown masked figures. The report was made to the police approximately five minutes ago. I am sending you the coordinates."_

"...Yeah, I figure this would come up at the most inopportune time ever." You glanced aside, frowning. "Did you bring your costume, by any chance?"

Peter blinked. "...Can I take the big shiny armor?"

* * *

**Author's Note:** The new arc is here! I'll post the next section tomorrow. Right now it's about four chapters worth of content here on ffnet, but since it's still ongoing I'm not sure how much will be added to that before the end. Cheers.


	5. Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (2)

**Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (3 - 4)**

Despite your best intentions, dark narratives spun themselves into existence as you repeated Jarvis' words in your head. Obadiah had acted suspiciously, the last time you'd seen him - paranoid. You'd put the thought aside at the time, a distraction that you didn't really understand. The flash drive he'd given you was still hidden in the bedroom, stashed away for safe-keeping. You hadn't really thought that this whole mess would blow open so soon.

That left you with two scenarios - both nasty. In one, Obadiah was paid off or somehow cooperating with the same thugs that had taken your guns, and probably hired Deadpool. In that view, he was a traitor - a turncoat. The flash drive would not contain important data - it would contain a virus, a malignant bug to attack your systems and shut them down. On the flip side, perhaps Obadiah _had _been kidnapped, and he'd been expecting that to happen. The drive was his confession, then.

You couldn't make the call on which was more likely - and neither did you have the time. You would look into the encrypted files later.

"Jarvis," you stated clearly. "Call Rhodey, and keep him updated on our location. You can inform him on what's going on, but it'll probably be funnier if he imagines the worst and brings a missile launcher or something." You strode towards the back of the lab, where you kept all your toys, already making sure you didn't leave anything useful behind. "Put S.H.I.E.L.D. on for me too, would you? Coulson probably wants in on this."

"_Of course, sir."_

You hesitated for a moment. "Oh - and build the armor up in the travel configuration, would you?"

"_Sir, any configuration beyond home-assembled is untested and highly -"_

"Yeah, yeah," you cut him off. "It's the only one that I can actually open without your help, and that's important," you explained as you glanced aside to Peter. "The connections between segments will be weaker, and odds are I'm losing out on flight-speed and height, but I'm _not _looking for a world record right now, just something that works. Make it happen."

"_...Understood."_

Peter looked flummoxed as metal arms dragged themselves out from under the floor once again, building the armor with mechanical precision, now that there was no squishy body in the way. "...What's going on here, exactly?" the boy asked. "What did the computer mean? Who's _Stane_? _Obadiah _Stane from the cover of Vanity Fair? He's missing?"

"Obviously, not anymore," you muttered dryly, grabbing the bulletproof vest that you'd assembled that same day, the ceramics neatly outlined by the hexagonal pattern of the supporting mesh. "And you read Vanity Fair? _Seriously_?" You shook your head. "In simple terms: Obadiah vanished after acting paranoid and dodgy. He was spotted in the company of various masked figures, and they're probably up to no good. And it all happens after I get involved in two separate near-death experiences that might be connected. You get the picture here?"

Peter nodded nervously. "Bad news."

"Yes. The police would need way too much filling in, and the army's not going to mobilize and be on-site in any acceptable time-span. There's really only one group that's already familiar with the basics enough to have a unit around," you said. "That's S.H.I.E.L.D. Think paramilitary superspies or the Men in Black - it's basically like that."

"And you work with these people?"

You would have answered, if not for the chiming noise across the intercom. _"Mr. Stark,"_Coulson's voice said from the speakers, and you gestured for Peter to stay silent. _"Your - AI - was quite insistent that I speak to you. What's going on?"_

You frowned as you paced across the length of the basement, ignoring the piles of unsorted mechanical parts that were spread all around from your designing binge. "You remember how we talked about the people who were smuggling my guns around, and who might be behind everything? They just overplayed their hand. I had Jarvis keep an eye out on public surveillance and he picked up my mentor, Obadiah Stane. It seems he has been taken by some questionable figures that like to hide their faces. You can do the same math from there."

"_You know where they are, then?" _Coulson demanded. _"We have limited coverage in your area - how big of a force are we dealing with?"_

"No clue. Jarvis will send you the coordinates - he was seen about twenty minutes by car from where I live, probably more if there's congestion. That is - if I were taking a car. I don't know what kind of tricks you people have, but get me some _backup_out there, would you?"

"_Stark - you are not going after this yourself," _Coulson stated with certainty. _"You have already been in two violent altercations, and the risk is too high. Especially if these people intend to kill you - they won't hesitate to hunt you down if they think you're onto them, you have to realize that."_

You sighed audibly. "Well, if you want to stop me from taking down the bastards that are ruining my company, then please _try._ I will be on-site in ten, so if you can make it by then, great! If not - I'm going in without you. In case you didn't notice when I poured crush into that last guy's eyes, I am _not _a helpless victim who hides from the bad things in the world."

"_Hm. Is that why you have hardly left the house in a month?"_

There was a long, tense silence, and it wasn't hard to deduce what Coulson was getting at. Aside from the pervasive surveillance the organization had access to, which you'd expected, it betrayed something about what S.H.I.E.L.D. had figured out about you - or thought they had, at least. And they were dead wrong.

"You think you know me, don't you?" you asked at last, glowering. "S.H.I.E.L.D. thinks I retreated into my basement to sulk like a broody teenager. You guys figured it had to be symptoms of PTSD, I suppose? Because of course someone who gets into trouble like this is traumatized_._ After all, there's no reason why an _engineer _might spend a lot of time in his workshop_, _is there_?_" You gathered yourself for a moment, balling your fists. "Honestly, you didn't even _ask!_"

"_Mr. Stark -" _Coulson sounded apologetic, but you weren't buying it.

"I've heard it all - spare me the pity, and help me. I want to do this thing quietly_,_unless we have no other choice_._You have someone put up a roadblock, and make sure that no civvies come anywhere near. If things do blow up, blame a gas-line or Godzilla or something." You ran a hand through tangled hair, and sighed. "I am getting Obi _out,_whether you are present or not, Coulson. Talk to Jarvis - he has more patience than I do." You signalled to cut the line and turned. "Damn it. Figures they'd start second-guessing me the moment my back's turned…"

You looked at the suit you were still clutching in a balled fist, and loosened your grip. "Here - put this on." You tossed over the ceramic-tiled armored vest to Peter, who snatched it out of the air easily, frowning as he considered it. "Put that under your spidery stuff or something. Don't want to cramp your style."

"What are you talkingabout?" Peter asked, glancing down at the metal-and-ceramic creation with a baffled expression. "What is it, exactly?"

You groaned. "Get with the program here. That is a tactical vest of my own design - it's made from custom hardened ceramics and steel, and it's the closest thing I have to tank armor that you can wear. There's a communication system wired into the lining at the neck, speech activated. Odds are we're heading into gunfire territory, so be smart and put it on." You turned, and paused. "That is - if you want to come with. Doing the hero thing, saving a life. I just assumed."

Peter flustered, glancing down at the bulletproof vest and back at you. "Yeah - Yes, of course I'll help. It's what I do. It's just, I don't usually _have _supplies, or expensive gear and such. And I'm not really used to anyone actually knowing about this -" He waved his hands vaguely.

"Superhero thing?" you concluded. "Yeah, I'm still getting used to that bit, too. Figured the old notes were exaggerated, but I guess dad was onto something…" You shook your head. "Just put on your equipment. Jarvis will make sure that there's minimal exposure via surveillance footage, so nobody will ask too many questions about why you're on the wrong side of the country."

"You're kind of abrasive," Peter observed. "Might wanna reconsider that if you're going out in bright shiny silver. I started off like that, and it didn't go well." He started to pull off his long-sleeve shirt when you noticed a glimmer of light reflecting off something inside, and your hand shot out before you could really think about it. You could tell from the frozen movement that Peter had forcefully stopped himself from reacting, from lashing out. The boy's responses were _amazing. _The device on his arm was that as well.

"What is _that?_" You demanded. Circling Peter's wrists were metal devices that had been hidden well inside his sleeves - it was probably why he wore long ones even on a hot day. They looked delicate, spindly, but you could tell without even examining them that they were far stronger that they seemed. At the end of each was some sort of nozzle, and halfway down there was a compartment that held a square cartridge. It was simply built, elegantly minimalist - and unfamiliar.

"They're - just my web-shooters," Peter said in surprise. "It's how I shoot webs, swing around. You did watch the news, right? They don't exactly hold back on showing what I can do. Half the time they're just rerunning the highlights..."

You shook your head. "You mean the webs aren't organic?" you asked slowly. "I thought - the various superpowers, spider-theme, spider silk - it made sense. But this…" You trailed off, studying the device critically. "Who on earth gave you _those _toys? They're way too functionally-oriented to be based on anything of mine - I have a tendency to accessorize - and I can't imagine Roxxon or Oscorp would…" You saw the boy wince. "Oscorp? Huh. I didn't think they had the chops."

"It's not theirs - I made the shooters myself," Peter said at last, and he looked away. "The web-fluid's Oscorp's though, originally. It was one of their experiments - and so was I, in a way. It's how I got to be… who I am."

You barely even heard the last part, focusing on the first few words. "Wait, you made these? You built a mechanism that lets you fire and manipulate spider-thread so that you can swing at ungodly speed - by yourself? It looks cobbled together, but it's still _very good work_. Did you build it in your basement or something?"

"The attic," Peter confessed.

"Hm. I started in the basement," you murmured. "You also got your hands on a steady supply of organic webbing strong enough to hold up entire cars_, _if I recall the internet footage correctly. How is that possible? That's -"

Peter looked downright uncomfortable now. "That was just the original formula, actually," he said as he shrugged. "I improved it, after the Lizard happened. And of course, the original source wouldn't last forever..."

You stared for a long moment. "You mean you make that stuff yourself? You single-handedly replicated and enhanced an Oscorp project that must have cost millions?" You blinked in astonishment as you cut yourself off, shoving aside the myriad ideas for testing Peter's ability in favor of more immediately problems. "Okay, I am _so _hiring you. Now - suit up, because I've been wasting the last three minutes _geeking out, _and we have some hero work to do_._"

Jarvis only spoke up after Peter disappeared, digging for something in his backpack. _"Sir - Mr. Rhodes is en-route to the target zone. No ships have arrived or left as of yet, but I cannot be certain of Mr. Stane's health without more equipment on-site."_

"You can't hijack a satellite or something?"

"_Quality of such footage is insufficient to make out more than shapes, sir. High-grade spy telescopes may be capable of more, but breaking into those would take some time, and there is a high chance of detection."_

"High-grade spy telescopes, huh? Wonder who has access to those?" You smiled as you made sure your micro-repulsor was ready, nodding confidently. "Contact S.H.I.E.L.D. and let them know what you need - if they're halfway helpful, they'll forward the important feeds. It's time to go hunting."

"So, what do I call you?" Peter asked as you walked over to the partially assembled armor you'd designed. "How about... Shellhead?"

* * *

Peter looked bulky wearing the ceramic vest under his Spider-Man costume - the latter was evidently made of stretchy material, and the shoulder-pads and the vest's slightly over-sized measurements made the boy rather more imposing than expected. The mask had a lot to do with the intimidation factor, too - seeing unnaturally athletic stunts suddenly seems much crazier when you added the huge bug eyes and flashy colors.

"This armor is a bit stiff for my taste," Peter commented lightly as he stretched, bending over backwards in a way that made your spine hurt just looking at it. "There's a reason I usually just go out in polyester and nylon, you know."

You snorted. "You can invent something cooler when we get you a lab or something. Why didn't you tell me you were a genius in the first place? I _like _geniuses," you quipped as you set a heavy metal foot on the deck behind the house; it creaked uncomfortably under the weight of the armor. "I just got an update from surveillance, and Jarvis counts at least twenty goons hanging around the harbor. Light weapons judging from the silhouettes, but we still go in quietly."

"...Your ride isn't very quiet," Peter pointed out, tapping the armor.

"I know. I'm landing it some distance away, and I'll stick close to the ground the entire way there. Even if these idiots hear anything, they won't have a context for it. It'll just sound like a distant rumble. Thunder, maybe. An airplane passing by." You frowned in realization as you thought of who you were meeting there. "Oh - I should warn you. We'll be meeting Rhodey at the landing site - and he's going to see through your mask in three seconds flat."

"...Ah. Another genius?"

"I'm sure he'd be flattered by that question," you responded easily. "Rhodey knew that you were coming over, and I've been avoiding answering why I would bother with meeting a reporter voluntarily, much less one from across the country. He'll figure this one out. So you'd better be comfortable with trusting me on this: he won't say a word."

Peter stared for a long moment. "You're sure? You trust him."

You nodded soberly.

"I suppose you could just tell him when my back is turned anyway," Peter said glumly. "Can't really put that genie back in the bottle, can I?" He shook his head. "Alright. What do we do from here? I'll deal with that stuff later."

"We move," you said, gearing up the flight surfaces as the data on nearby flights filtered into view across the UI of your helmet - you wouldn't need it today, but it was always handy. "I didn't bring my armor as a show of force - it's _transportation_. I figured you didn't have many buildings to do your swingy thing from around here, and driving for twenty minutes is just going to give these assholes time to get away. So - have you ever hear about this thing some spiders do, called ballooning?"

"Yes, it's -" Peter stopped. "Wait, you're not saying that I should -"

"I am. Unless you want to literally ride me?" You asked dryly. "Which would be disturbing on several levels, and it would probably cut you up because the edges on this thing aren't designed to be comfortable in the slightest?"

"You want me to take a lift by hanging on a thread beneath you instead," Peter summed up. "I'd be clinging for dear life and praying that the webbing holds as we scream to our destination at half the speed of sound. Probably worse."

You smiled. "Yup."

"Sounds fun!"

* * *

"Descending to two-hundred feet," you said over the roar of the repulsors, confident that Jarvis would patch through your message to the human spider that dangled dozens of feet beneath you, suspended only by the incredibly thin wire he'd spun and wrapped around the ankle of your suit. You'd reached over a third of the speed of sound with him there, edging on half, and even at those speeds the boy kept fast, hanging almost horizontally behind you as you weaved and banked along the coast. He was _insane._

Of course, it had occurred to you that if not for the suit you were wearing, protecting you from the elements, you were doing the same thing - you were cruising a miracle of your own. You had never taken the suit out before - you hadn't even tested the flight systems beyond stationary tests. But without a sputter, without even a hitch, the repulsors had roared alive and pushed you into the air, flying instead of hovering as air cut past you at blistering speeds.

Some other day, you would push it higher, ascending to the highest elevations or the greatest speeds and breaking records - but that was not today. The adrenaline that surged in your veins was only half in response to your success - the other part was all Obi. He was, in some ways, the only part of your father's legacy that you could face head-on.

"Going to one-hundred feet, prepare for final approach," you said. You'd muted the channel a long time before to get rid of the obscenely loud noise of the air rushing past, but Jarvis would certainly still pick up any words in return. 'Wahoo!' was the only vaguely recognizable word that you'd picked up - it summed up the situation pretty well.

"Jarvis, any update from Coulson?"

"_Not as of yet, sir."_

"Guess they're slow to roll out," you concluded. "Right. Tell Rhodey to look up, Jarvis."

You had only noticed the man and his car instants before you touched down with a thud, reducing your airspeed from two dozen miles an hour to nothing in a puff of energy that seared the ground below your feet. Right besides you, landing in a crouch, Peter acted as if nothing had happened at all. He rose up, and for the first time _ever,_you saw Rhodey's eye twitch. Surprise - or perhaps even _fear _was present for a split second as he glanced between the huge silver Goliath that had dropped out of the sky and the costume-clad superhero. The man had a gun in his hand before you'd even blinked_._

"Spare your bullets, Rhodey," you said as you flipped open the lid of your helmet. The torso and upper legs of the armor slowly retracted and folded away, leaving you just enough room to wiggle free of the metal mesh. The process wasn't easy nor _comfortable, _but it was doable - and you'd have plenty of time to work out the kinks later. "It's just me in here - no tricks."

"What the _hell _is that thing, Tony?" Rhodey demanded, staring. "Did you build _this _in these last weeks?" He frowned. "You _told _me you didn't have enough time to make my jet-pack. But it's because you were making a better one for yourself?That's bullshit." His mock-offended expression faded , and he smiled. "I want one of those - you knew I would."

"I called dibs already," Peter declared, crossing his arms.

"And I am the only one with the money to pay for one," you added dryly as you shook free from the confining boots. "Rhodey - this guy here is Spider-Man. Spider-Man - James Rhodes, the best damn military liaison you could hope for. Though there isn't really a market for them. It's sort of a - well, not _pity _position, exactly..."

"Tony," Rhodey said dangerously. He looked at Peter for a long moment, and something like realization ghosted across his face. "Ah. So _that's _why… But how the hell did you notice?"

You shrugged. "He slipped up in Vegas."

Rhodey nodded, narrowing his eyes. "Cool. Very cool. Didn't know you had bona fide superheroes on speed dial," he observed slowly. "So - what's the plan, exactly? Because I'm seeing a distinct lack of black spy helicopters."

"Even S.H.I.E.L.D. can't be _everywhere,_" you explained. "Though I'm sure they like to pretend they are. We have a short window to take care of this ourselves."

"_Sir,"_Jarvis piped up. "_I have access to several local feeds and orbital footage, now - the total number of people is unchanged, but at least two individuals are likely leadership figures of some sort. I am also reading limited thermal activity inside one of the ships, possibly the hostages. Most likely there are between three and five individuals present, though the infrared scan is too indistinct to tell with certainty."_

You nodded. "And the two odd people you mentioned? Any pictures?"

"_Neither has been recorded with recognizable facial features, and narrowing down search still leaves tens of thousands of possible matches. I will require superior footage."_

"Yeah, I'll get on that," you decided. "Until we get closer, we won't know what we're dealing with - so keep low. Rhodey, you pick the biggest, baddest gun you can find, and hole up on a second or third floor. Make sure you have a good look across the docks. You've got tranq rounds - if you run out, don't hesitate to pick the real stuff." You glanced over your shoulder. "Spidey - you're our recon expert. You're flexible, and the only one that's got bona fide super soldier power, so you get to run the gauntlet. You've got your - webs to make a non-lethal take-down, and I assume your physical strength would suffice if you really have to do anything more permanent_._"

"I'm not going to -" Peter protested, but you ignored him.

"Jarvis will keep us all up to date if anything happens - S.H.I.E.L.D. will call, but they'll only talk to me so you two can keep off their grid for a bit longer. Also -" You turned back to the armor, digging into pocket and retrieving the arc reactor you'd stuffed in there when you left home. Shoving it into the center of the empty armor's chest, the whole thing powered up. "With his new upgrade, Jarvis can handle some basic remote control of the suit. It will travel under the surface of the water, disabling all but one escape route for the enemy - the most obvious one. The big ship."

"...You sure I can't wear that thing?" Rhodey wondered.

"It's waterproof, but not buoyant," you warned. "The armor will remain nearby at all times, in case I need it in a jiffy. It can do some simple things I programmed in, but it can't really act without my mental instructions, so don't rely on it." You nodded as the suit slid closed, and it slowly and mechanically turned towards the water, walking in without even a hesitation. Its top quickly vanished beneath the waves.

You felt awfully naked without armor, and without the high-tech vest you'd handed to Peter, you had to rely on good old Kevlar again - the stuff that had already failed you at least once. Between the micro-repulsor and the mutant cattle prod from hell, though, you were good on the offensive side. You would just have to be _careful._

"We're about five minutes away on foot, so we shaved about ten minutes off our arrival time," you decided as you gestured ahead. "If we fail here, people might die, so don't hesitate to get nasty if you are forced to. However much of a pacifist you might be. Lock and load."

* * *

You had never been very good at Hide and Seek. Beyond the fact that you'd been a spindly kid with an arrogant ass for a father and technology as your only resource, it wasn't really a big surprise that you ended up labelled a nerd - even in a school ostensibly _for _nerds. In those early years, your dad already had plans for you, and playing was never really something you were allowed to do. Men didn't play, after all, as Howard claimed.

Perhaps that was one reason you'd never stopped treating life like a game.

You were making up for lost time now, though, making your way around metal storage containers, most of them rusted and ancient, and moving between pallets of supplies that had to have been sitting there for nigh on three months. This particular harbor was closed - likely a private one that went under, financially ruined. Now it had _squatters._You couldn't afford to be seen by any of them - not this soon. Even with three people, you were at a huge disadvantage.

"Any contacts yet?" you whispered, and the negations came almost instantly, just loud enough to be audible. You couldn't tell where Peter was - you had a vague idea of Rhodey's position, but it was far behind you and irrelevant. The taser in your left hand sparked dangerously as you kept it ahead of you, ready for a stab. If you hit right, the person wouldn't even be able to scream before their body just failed and dropped.

"_Got my first two,"_ Peter whispered from somewhere. _"Looks like hired guns. Literally - they're nobodies, but they've got six guns between them. I put some trackers on them, but I'm not sure they'll be of any use."_

"Nice job, anyway," you muttered, turning the corner that led towards the central open area behind the packing crates and containers, where the ships were moored. You still had plenty of stuff in between you and the wide-open spaces, but you kept low. "Got a visual yet, Rhodey?"

"_I haven't seen Stane,_" Rhodey responded immediately. _"I saw a flash of gold, though, when one of the two leaders popped up for a moment."_

"Any identification, Jarvis?"

The AI didn't respond for a long moment. _"Processing - no definite hits."_

You grimaced as you turned another corner, shuffling sideways along the crate until you popped out your head for a split second. You retreated just in time, as a heavily armed black-cloaked figure turned on the spot, pausing only momentarily before continuing on. A scout, perhaps, or a sentry - you'd only barely missed running into the guy.

"_Sir, t__wo men are approaching from your south," _Jarvis said, and you turned around swiftly, repulsor raised protectively in front of you. Thankfully, there was as yet nobody in sight.

"Rhodey -"

"_Got 'em."_

You hadn't heard a shot - hadn't even noticed the brief noise of the tranquilizer rounds soaring across your position to catch two people in the throat, bringing them down. You didn't need to turn back to see what happened - you knew already. Rhodey was _good._

"_I'm up to nine," _Peter whispered, and you weren't entirely sure what to say to that. Between you, more than half the enemies had fallen without even raising an alarm. _"You guys have to catch up. Honestly, the last group didn't even have time to turn around."_

"Why am I even here," you murmured irritably as you rose, departing again to follow the sentry you'd just spotted. "Hold up…"

You dived around the corner. You hadn't expected your target to be standing directly around the corner, and you acted before you could reconsider the decision. Your makeshift taser flashed forwards, and you buried its prongs into the man's chest before he could raise his gun, and then you _squeezed._

There was a brief moment of surprise and astonishment in the man's eyes, and a heady feeling of a storm in the air, a charge that rippled outwards. There was no thunder. Sparks flashed between the man's body and your weapon as he slumped back, his muscles spasming. _You _hadn't made a noise. The man had terrible trigger discipline, though, and a burst of bullets ripped out of the man's rifle as it was flung aside by his convulsions.

The sharp noises seemed to freeze everything

Then the shouting started.

"_They know," _Peter simply said, and in the next moment you didn't need to listen to know what he was doing - a wire launched upwards from across the harbor, latching onto a crane, and a figure shimmied up unnaturally quickly. Not to be outdone, you _moved, _your micro-repulsor ready as you reset the taser.

"_Seven - eight new targets appeared from inside the ship," _Rhodey announced. "_You poked the hornet's nest, Tony. Some lady with a mask on just exited onto the deck, and she's looking mighty pissed."_

"Jarvis?" you asked as you ran, skidding around the corners. You'd barely even seen a glimpse of black before you fired the repulsor at maximum strength, and the ground simply _exploded,_the top layers billowing out in an expanded cloud of dust. "Jarvis, you know what to do. Get ready."

"_Understood, sir. Searching database."_

You'd never appreciated how fluid and impossibly fast Peter was from the blurry police footage you'd seen - swinging on wires was commonplace, but not _this. _The boy seemed to outright disregard gravity, boosting himself upwards with only a slight tug on his webs, using a single loading crane as his support, looping himself around and over it to dodge the sprays of bullets that went wild, and then smashing people into the ground on his way down, skirting across the ground and missing it by mere inches.

At least three shots glanced across the boy's torso, diverting away due to your vest, and you were suddenly terribly glad that you'd decided to give it away. Peter didn't even seem to notice, his hands flashing out with sprays of sticky netting, pinning two more people to the floor until they could no longer move. Then, he darted back into the sky, ascending his web lines as if they were flat ground.

"Jarvis?" you asked distractedly. "Update?"

"_The masked woman has been identified by alias. S.H.I.E.L.D. claims she is an assassin and thief going by the name 'Madame Masque'. Known for several large-scale heists, three murders, and worse. It is unknown how many women wear the mask, since at least some of the crimes could not have been committed by the same person due to their simultaneity."_

You only barely listened to Jarvis' explanation as you slammed yourself against the metal wall of a shipping container, glimpsing around the corner just enough to see three people tumbling through the air at the end of web lines, strung up by their ankles to the shipping crane above. Two more were pasted quite literally against the ship, only their faces visible. Peter was having _fun, _it seemed.

"Rhodey - how am I looking here?" You asked, taking deep breaths.

He answered almost immediately. _"Two more are heading your way - still no sign of Stane. Are you sure he's out here? I mean, it's obvious these goons are trigger-happy, but we could be dealing with a diversion. There's been enough time to smuggle someone out."_

"S.H.I.E.L.D. here yet? Because this can't continue for long."

You didn't receive an answer, but you hadn't really expected one either. It wasn't like you had time to wait around when bullets were flying - and at least you'd thinned the herd quite a bit. With only half the original force remaining, if that, these hired guns were outmatched, now. Outmatched by a seventeen-year old in red pajamas.

"_Hey, Shellhead - I'm getting some real wiggy feelings from the ship," _Peter commented, sounding remarkably calm for someone who was just fingerling himself through the air like an acrobat on speed. "_Are you sure they didn't rig that thing to blow? It'd suck if we went in there and just found a complimentary fireball."_

"Can't be sure, but I don't see why they'd rig their own escape route," you muttered. "What's with this 'wiggy' feeling, anyway?"

"_Um - It's an extra sense, sort of? Danger detection? It's how I avoid crashing into things, dodge people, that sort of thing. Advance warning."_

"Seriously?" You demanded. "That's just cheating. Who the hell knows about spiders that have precognition, anyway?" You frowned. "You 'sensed' something from the ship, though?"

_"Yeah. Something bad's gonna happen…"_

"Keep an eye out. Rhodey - cover me," You took a deep breath, gathering yourself as you threw yourself around the corner, arm raised and aimed before either of the two figures that approached could fire. The first was hit in the face by the blast, and slammed backwards to tackle the second.

"We need to get onto the ship - get Obi out, then leave before hell breaks loose like Spidey thinks," you said clearly. "Jarvis - do we have a route in there?"

"_Yes, but there are at least six more armed combatants present inside the vessel, sir."_

"Only six?" you joked. "It's -"

You didn't get to finish your sentence. _"Sir! I am reading severe radiation levels in your vicinity - potentially lethal," _Jarvis declared, louder than before. Judging from the startled pause in Peter's swing back onto the crane, he'd heard it too. _"I am reading large amounts of beta radiation emanating from the direction of the vessel."_

"They've got a _nuke _in there_?_" You demanded incredulously. "Since _when_? Why didn't you notice it before? How do nukes appear out of thin air?" You skidded to a halt as you saw a positively huge figure departing the ship, carrying an over-sized gun under his arm. "It's not - that guy, is it? What are we dealing with, here? A dirty bomb?"

Rhodey spoke up. _"That guy's dragging a helicopter weapon around in his bare hands, Tony - that's not _human_. It's - crazy. He's wearing more Kevlar than I thought was possible. I don't think shooting him's going to do much good unless I get him in the face. And that would be pretty bad if we want to question him."_

Fantastic - another super soldier. That was a secondary concern, though, for the moment. "I'm more worried about the _radiation,_" you muttered. "Beta radiation - that's electrons. What the hell would put out mass quantities of those? Some kind of weird railgun? Star Trek phasers?" You were about to make up something else, when you noticed it. A blue glow that emanated from the top of the weapon. "Jarvis - what's the power source on that thing, exactly?"

The AI's silence lasted for longer than you were used to. _"Sir, it - appears to resemble an arc reactor,"_he said at last, reluctant. _"The closest visual analogue is the large model situated at the Stark building, scaled down to fit the weapon._I cannot make any deeper analysis with this much interference._"_

You couldn't believe it.

You _really _couldn't believe it. Not only had the arc reactor's improved technology been kept in-house, but it had been kept _in-brain, _so far. The production details had not leaked - they could not have leaked. Also, an arc reactor did not put out any appreciable radiation, certainly not enough to make Jarvis freak out from a hundred feet away, given that you were carrying one around in your chest.

That meant the weapon _looked _like it ran on arc reactor - but it was something else. The design was entirely cosmetic, nothing more. There was only one reason you could see someone doing that: to discredit your new power source before it had even gone to market, to associate it with weaponry early. Exactly what you'd hypothesized just days earlier. Which meant that more than likely, someone was taping all this.

"Jarvis - are you still scrambling nearby recording equipment?"

"_Of course, sir."_

Recording or not, if the gun didn't really run on an arc reactor, the blue glow would have to make sense another way - and the electrons were the key to solving that puzzle. When particles were accelerated to a higher speed than light in a medium, which possible, then a special kind of radiation was emitted. Usually that just happened in nuclear pools - but here it was happening right in front of your eyes. These were the telltale shine of Cherenkov radiation.

"Peter, don't come near that thing! My suit can take it, yours _can't._"

"But -" Peter protested.

"Don't worry - I got this. Jarvis - launch!"

The blast of the engines roared to life in the distance, and a huge plume of water ascended high into the sky behind the ship, carrying your armor along in the spray. The suit pivoted, twisting slowly on its axis until it faced the other way, and fell at speed towards the solid stonework of the loading platform. The boot jets didn't even fire as the suit crashed down with enough force to crack the concrete, opening up to let you slip in.

All the best plans failed when you met the enemy - but you still had a shot to win. Right here, right now.

It was time to go to town.

* * *

You turned slowly towards the new threat, the suit latching itself closed around you as you did. The blue glow of your enemy's weapon brightened ominously.

It was true that you'd made a lot of weapons in your day - cluster missiles, miniature remote detonators, the mother of all landmines - but there was one area you'd always willfully strayed far clear from, even when the government tried to arrange a deal. That was one of the few times that you had agreed with your dad's company policies: chemical warfare research was tolerated, biological experiments had the occasional moment in the limelight, but the company had never gone truly nuclear.

Granted, building the bastard cousin of a fusion reactor was a recent project of yours, but even that was not something that actually irradiated anyone; the greatest risks were related to toxicity of the components, not riddling your body with cancer. But the Arc Reactor was the most stable application of the technology you could imagine, and even _that _scared you with its potential, which said enough about all the other possibilities. You'd never even considered building a proper nuke - or even designing one in more than errant sketches that were quickly shredded afterwards.

You'd stayed very far away from weaponizing one of the most dangerous forces ever discovered, but it had hardly been for humanitarian reasons. The same worry that plagued your progress on making the arc reactor an actual commercial product, had always clouded the potential of nuclear energy. In the wrong hands, such technology could be truly _monstrous._

"Stay back. I mean it," you said shortly as the suit slipped closed around your limbs, fastening itself as bolts turned on their own. You didn't specify to whom the message applied - Rhodey, Peter or S.H.I.E.L.D. - because it didn't matter. "Jarvis, engage the protective latticework, and make sure you're monitoring if the armor's taking _all _the beating. I'd like to avoid a tan."

"_Sir, the suit's resistance against outside threats is largely reliant on it being tightly sealed - a feature not present in the travel configuration you are presently using."_

There was a long, tense silence, and you grimaced. Without Jarvis's perfect control over assembling the suit around your body, it would only keep out perhaps ninety or ninety-five percent of environmental hazards. Which would be _fine _in most cases_, _if not for the fact that you really, really weren't interested in getting skin cancer - or worse, seeing as the eye slots were rather poorly isolated. There was nothing like going blind on your first day out…

"Engage the secondary protective layer, then," you said as you faced the brute with his over-sized weapon. The man seemed amused at your hesitance, perhaps aware just how dangerous the gun he carried was - even if he bore it like a club. "The resistance upgrade should help, right?"

"_That system is not complete, sir. Without further hardening, parts of it might fail when exposed to -"_

"Yeah, yeah, I know it's not finished. I built it, remember," you said irritably. "Activate it anyway. Some protection beats none - and I'm the only one who can even get close to the guy as it is..."

"_Of course, sir."_

The sizzle of electricity just above your skin felt oddly reassuring, though you knew it was only a partial fix for dealing with the radiation. You hadn't even finished the backside of the second layer, which meant that part of you was protected by only thin layers of metal and fabric, interlocking poorly enough to let through an unhealthy amount of radiation directly into your spine. Which would probably kill you. On the bright side - you wouldn't go blind. Yay.

"Spidey," you whispered as you set a heavy foot forward, drawing the brute's attention as your eyes strayed to the ship. "You can't go near this guy, and I'm serious about that. Odds are that if he's got a heavy-duty nuclear source in there, he's gonna break out the gamma rays any moment now. I can take a bit of a beating - you are wearing _nylon._"

Peter sounded miffed across the radio. _"I can do ranged! I've got these nifty things called _webs, _you see..."_

"Well, Rhodey can do ranged stuff too," you said immediately. "I don't think Brick-for-brains here is a genius, so I doubt he's the head honcho either. The guy's holding a _nuke _with his bare hands_, _for crying out loud! Keep an eye on the masked chick for me, would you? If you get a shot at dragging Obi out, then take it - but keep yourself safe."

"_I'm being benched for this? Seriously?"_

"Webhead - we all have our roles, and you're not the guy wearing radiation-hardened heavy metal power armor." You raised your fists, revealing the full-sized repulsors inside. "Just back me up for now."

"_...Alright."_the boy replied, and though he sounded despondent, you could tell there was something more going on. You decided to leave _that _for another time.

"...Hey, ugly!" you cried out then, amplified by your armor, and you walked closer to the heavily-armed brute with your hands raised, twin repulsors glowing dangerously. The huge man raised his brow, tapping his gun with his free hand as he smiled, exposing teeth that were stained brown. Damn, he really _was _ugly. "...Wanna put that thing away?" you asked, nodding to the gun. "Fight this out with fists?"

Well, you hadn't really expected it to work, but it was worth a shot.

"Stark," the man rumbled, sniffing the air as he shook his head. "Where is your little skittery friend, huh? I was looking forward to crushing that bug." He grinned. "Well, I suppose you will do. I never thought you'd dare to come yourself…"

"...Am I supposed to know who you are?" you inquired slowly.

The man's smile turned to a scowl, and his eyes seemed to glow with inner light. "You always were a jackass, Stark. Four years I worked for you - four years of perfect service. And you don't even remember my face_._"

You blinked in confusion. "I run a company with hundreds, maybe thousands of employees," you explained simply, wracking your mind over where you'd seen the guy before. Not R&D certainly, nor anything that required expertise - it had to be personal protection, or driving. "I don't know all my employees. So, what are you saying, anyway? You were let go, and now you're out for revenge with hand-held nukes?Have to tell ya - kind of an overreaction."

"Not everything is about _you,_" the huge man mumbled. "I was hired to do a job here, and I intend to fulfill it. Whether or not you are in a tin can doesn't matter to me." He raised his giant rifle again, smirking. "I've been enhanced. Your steel doesn't scare me in the least."

"Enhanced?"

He smirked, tapping his weapon lovingly. "This beauty here… Betsy's my baby, but Lola's a close second. Nobody else can wield her like I can." He grinned widely. "She's… magnificent."

So - he named his weapons.

"_He named that thing _Lola?" Rhodey commented distantly. "_I suppose it beats Little Boy…"_

"I don't remember you," you said carefully, ignoring the voice in your ear. "I'm willing to strike a deal - I don't want to hurt you if I don't need to. If you let me pass, I won't attack."

"Why would you remember me?" the huge man wondered. "We've never met before."

You blinked in confusion. "Didn't you just say -"

"SHUT UP!" your opponent barked savagely, rage bursting into existence from nowhere. "YOU DIE, NOW!"

You heard Rhodey's distant warnings in your ear, and you probably would've heard Coulson if you hadn't muted him, but you didn't hesitate. Twin beams of searing light erupted from your palms, full-power repulsors tearing across the bulky weapon of your opponent and leaving a bright glowing line behind, smoking slightly.

The seven foot tall giant didn't wait around for a second shot, whipping his gun around even as it smoldered in his hand, essentially undamaged. It wasn't just powerful, it was _tough._

"_Sir! I am detecting potentially lethal build-up of energy!"_Jarvis piped up.

"Jarvis? I just activated primary _and _secondary protections. That should be enough to take a missile to the _face_," you noted in disbelief as you skidded back, hovering barely an inch above the ground with your repulsors. "How freaking powerful is that gun, anyway?"

You didn't have time to think about the numbers, because the weapon burst into blue light at its apex, and little red warnings lights blinked into sight as Jarvis blurted some warning or another into your ears. You'd reacted before your A.I. could finish his sentence, whipping your arms to the side in reflex. With a burst of concentrated energy, uncoordinated and sudden, you flung yourself out of the figure's path, out of the _beam's _path.

In your wake, everything went crystalline _white._

For a long, unmentionable moment, it seemed as if you were weightless, and the world was utterly silent - then the _noise _came. A wave of incredible sound, a cacophony that was dulled to still painful levels by the suit, thundering right through layers of metal and isolating materials. When the light around you resolved back into recognizable shapes, they weren't the same ones as before. It had been a glancing blow.

"What the -" you asked yourself half-coherently, realizing that you had tossed yourself head-over-heels behind some of the shipping containers that lined the harbor, embedding your metal-ringed torso halfway into the concrete as you slammed down into the ground. You couldn't hear whether Peter or Rhodey had been close enough to be hit - they were a lot farther off than you, at least. They were probably fine.

_What the _hell _was _that?!_  
_

"Jarvis?" you demanded breathlessly. "Status!"

"Sir - y_ou were hit by a concentrated blast of electrical energy, as well as an anomalous energy signature that is not in the database,"_ the AI explained swiftly. "_The armor's primary protections are largely intact - several secondary protections have failed and will need manual repair."_

Fantastic. You crawled upright slowly, wincing inside the suit when it chafed and scraped against your skin as plates shifted back and forth. Without the tighter connections that Jarvis could provide, something had clearly shaken loose. On top of the damage, your side hurt, again, probably because your wound had opened again - and you could taste blood on your tongue.

"Where is he, Jarvis?"

"_Sir - Might I suggest retreating? The enemy's weapon's clearly too powerful for the armor to adequately handle, and S.H.I.E.L.D. should be arriving within minutes. They will likely have more effective measures for dealing with this threat."_

"Oh god, you're a Coulson fanboy now, aren't you?" you asked, taking a deep breath. "You're a traitor, that's what you are. Now tell me, _where is he? _Use a Geiger counter if you need to, sheesh!"

"_Of course, sir. The target is - Warning: two-hundred feet and closing. One-hundred. Twenty -"_

"Ah, f-" You blasted off with all four repulsors, and your breath was knocked out of you just as another burst of white passed by just below you, a beam of electrons and _something else _that billowed outward across the half-destroyed containers, vanishing in fractions of a second and leaving only blackened remains. "Fiddlesticks?" you finished halfheartedly as you caught yourself, remembering who was listening.

"_Tony - get the hell out of there!"_Rhodey called across the radio. _"That weapon -"_

"Yeah. Time to get rid of it," you murmured as you turned in the air, keeping up your speed as you followed the giant's slow and ponderous movements. You knew it had to be a facade - it could be nothing else after he'd almost hit you twice with that massive gun of his. When he wanted to, the enormous figure could move incredibly quickly, his bodybuilder physique hiding someone nearly as dexterous as Peter. "Rhodey - switch over to actual bullets if you haven't yet, maybe some explosive ones. I think that on this guy, they'll be _distractions,_mostly."

"_Already done. They're - bouncing off his skin."_

You nodded as you brought forward both your arms, balancing on the jets in your boots. The figure below you twitched, bringing his weapon up and aiming with precision, just as you got ready to blast off again. "Right, Jarvis - focus all power to the front of the armor. We need to survive at least a second of the beam. If this guy's as sturdy as all that, nothing less will do."

"_You wish to take the beam's full force? Sir, the risk is -"_

"Never tell me the odds," you barked. "Divert all gathered power to left hand repulsor, and be ready to fire as soon as it's charged!"

You only realized in that moment, a stretched out second before the face-off, why the weapon you faced seemed so _strange._Beyond the facsimile of an Arc Reactor that was bolted to the top of it, it had an aesthetic that was altogether different from any military design you knew. The rounded edges, glowing lines, and the thick armor suggested it was more a show-model than a real weapon - but it certainly felt genuine.

But what was most telling was the huge, over-sized grip on the bottom, unused by the man who faced you. It was as if the weapon had been made for a hand three times the size of even its current user, a massive claw of a hand. It was a weapon for a real giant.

The blue glow of the Cherenkov effect intensified for a split second when energy flowed forward in a wave from the barrel of the gun, resolving into a beam as it interacted with the atmosphere around it. The very air caught on fire as it passed at incredible speed, and a mixture of high-speed electrons, wild bursts of electricity, and something _other _impacted on the chest section of your armor. You were pushed up into the sky by a surge of raw destruction, annihilation in nuclear form.

You heard a distant cry, piercing and high-pitched, as you pushed your hand-repulsor forward into the onslaught, and squeezed the trigger.

There was only _white._

* * *

_White._

Everything was white and hotter than the sun, incandescent and luminous.

The very air was light, matter turned to joyful energy as it rushed outwards in all directions, freed from its constraints.

It felt _wonderful._

Everything felt - it felt -

_White._

You opened your eyes in surprise, but nothing changed. You couldn't feel a thing - not even your own body. There was no heat, no cold, no touch. You weren't even sure you'd really moved, because there was no way to tell. There was just _light._

"...Am I dead?" you tried to ask, but the question bounced around only inside your mind. It was impossible to tell if it had made its way out into a real world, if there was anyone around to hear. You couldn't see anything more than the brightness, couldn't hear anything but your own thoughts, your own imagination. The whole of everything was - you.

This had to be -

_White._

You remembered firing the repulsor, blasting your way downwards towards the cascade that flowed from the barrel of that monstrous, alien weapon. You remembered the fire from your make-shift blast interacting with the electron stream, with the power that it channeled towards you. For an instant, it had been a futile endeavor, a hopelessly weak counter - then something else had joined your shot - a conflagration of unimaginably hot fire, a fearful cry of might.

In the face of what was unleashed, the weapon had _exploded._

Fire followed in its wake - incredible flames, an inferno that had incinerated everything that was there at the heart of the collision, a flash of heat that should have evaporated you, cooked the flesh off your bones, and turned the bones to dust and ash. The heat was too great to imagine, hotter than the core of suns.

"Seriously, am I dead? How can I be dead if I can still think?" you tried to ask. "Hello?"

Peter had called out, in the last few moments - you remembered his voice. You'd seen him from the corner of your eye, a distant spot of red-and-blue, silhouetted against the sky. He'd been headed your way, despite his promise to stay out of the way - of course he would risk his life. He was a _hero._

Rhodey - he had said something, too. Called your name, from way out in his distant perch, his eagle's nest. Whatever he'd said, though, it had slipped away into the -

_White._

Something had _changed. _You felt a distant tingle across your skin, a flash of pain that lasted too briefly to truly hurt. In the distance, in the whiteness, great towers of unimaginable size stretched out into nothingness, forbidding structures that seemed as inviting as they were terrifying. And between them, suspended in the air, something gargantuan floated.

It was greater than worlds, more luminous than a whole galaxy even in the brightness.

An egg.

Pain flashed through you, a burst of agony that seared your skin, made you remember you _had _skin in the first place. You welcomed the feeling, realizing that it meant you were alive - alive, even a little bit.

The towers faded back into the mist, but the egg remained, surrounded by a red glow that reminded you of a terrible moment you had tried to forget. They were vapors of another place that should not exist, beyond the white and the real world, existing in the...

_Gray._

The white had gone, and it was only then that you shivered, realizing that the coldness you felt wasn't cold at all - that you'd been caught in unbearable heat, before, even if you did not mind it. You recognized the cold only after you'd lost its antithesis.

There was nothing to see, now. Nothing except a mirror, an image of yourself that stared back with a small smile playing around the edges of his mouth. Then there was eerie -

_Black._

Not much of the moment remained in your memory.

Just enough to matter.

* * *

"_Tony!"_someone yelled into your ear as you gasped in surprise or shock, taking in a deep, desperate gulp of air. You were on the ground, on your back, tangled in webbing - and a vast plume of smoke was smeared across the sky above you. A black shape among them resolved into red and blue. "Are you alright in there?" Peter asked.

You were alive.

_Alive._

The mask of the suit opened on its own, probably at Jarvis's unspoken command - or perhaps you'd simply failed to hear him through the beeping in your ears. Peter seemed relieved as you met his eyes, even through his mask - it was unusually expressive. You raised an arm to try and set his mind at ease, but it rose only slowly.

"...What happened?" you wondered.

"_Tony!" _Rhodey yelled into your air through the radio. "_What the hell did you think you were doing? You could have died!"_

"...I know that, Pepper," you murmured distantly, blinking in confusion as you glanced down towards the direction of the ship - only to find a vast column of steam rising up into the sky, towering over the flattened shape of the man you'd been fighting. You could tell he was breathing, still - his barrel-chest was moving up and down slowly - but he would not be using his gun again. Lola was scattered in pieces across the docks.

_Shit._

"Get out! Radioactive materials from that gun have to be everywhere!" you declared. "Jarvis?!"

"_I am reading only slightly elevated levels of radiation, sir. The source of the beta radiation that was generated is at present unknown."_

"Huh. New research project, I guess," you murmured as you turned around, heaving yourself upright and vomiting all over your armor. "...Ugh."

Peter laughed under his breath, perhaps a little hysterically.

"Well, that was - violent," you said after a little while, trying to make rhyme or reason of that moment you'd been locked into the beam, captured within its heart. For an instant, it seemed as if space and time had been ripped apart, dissected before your eyes. And now everything was right back down to earth. It didn't make _sense._

For a moment, it seemed as if the stolen weapons, the bickering with S.H.I.E.L.D. and hiring Peter were irrelevant concerns, compared to what you'd seen in that moment. Was that a near-death experience? You'd nearly-died enough to be due for one...

"...Let's just get Obi," you said at last, reluctantly turning away from the person you'd defeated, though you weren't sure _how._You'd intended to fire into the barrel of the nuclear gun, cutting right past the heavy armor and into the firing mechanism - but you were certain that the repulsor ray had never reached the inside at all, overpowered by the nuclear gun. That meant it had reacted with the beam itself, somehow. You had caused an implosion - but you had no idea _what _had reacted to make that happen.

With a shiver, you thought back to the cave, to that wave of incandescent fury as you lit the Pyre.

_That _was what you'd been reminded of.

"_S.H.I.E.L.D. is requesting an explanation of the explosion," _Jarvis announced dryly._"Quite vigorously, I might add."_

"Put them through," you muttered, and you didn't wait for the agency to speak up. "Heya, Coulson!" you said lamely. "I just defused a nuclear threat with extreme prejudice - so you're welcome for that. I am fine, thank you. Now, stop spamming the line, and let me get on with ass-kicking, or get yourself over here. Slowpoke."

"_This is not Agent Coulson," _a new voice spoke in reply, sounding rather more severe than the amicable man you'd met, and you paused.

"Um, hi? Who is this?"

"_I am Director Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. I am currently en route to survey the situation - if it has not already been resolved. You have made many people very nervous, Mr. Stark."_

"So, you're the big Kahuna himself, huh?" You asked, still breathless. "What can I do for ya?"

"_You can work with me. Two significant threats to national security are present at your - operation. One of them is considered a major hazard."_

"Let me guess - you're talking about a gal with a mask, and a guy who never has to worry about radiation sickness?" you wondered dryly as you limped over to the unconscious form of the man you'd taken out. "You can come pick up the latter. I'm still working on the other one."

"_His name is Frank Simpson - he's a long-term interest of ours."_

"...He said he used to work for me," you murmured. "Is that true?"

"_Not according to our files. __I'm afraid that Mr. Simpson is - delusional. It is doubtful that anything he says is trustworthy."_

You sighed. "And the nuke? How did he get his hands on it?"

"_Unknown - but we are working on that question," _Fury grumbled. _"We have also been tracing the activity of the assassin known as Madame Masque for some time, and we suspected you had hired her services on behalf of your company. Recent events seem to draw that conclusion into question."_

"Really now? Was it the attempts on my life that tipped you off?" you asked dryly. "Because I would count those."

"_The second most likely person to be responsible for hiring them is presently unaccounted for. I believe you are looking for him."_

You felt a shiver run down your back. "You're not implying…?"

"_Mr. Obadiah Stane was spotted conversing with a person by the description of Madame Masque just two days ago. It is likely that he is involved in a dispute between the assassin and her - superior."_

_Obi _had hired assassins? The very idea seemed utterly preposterous, akin to Rhodey betraying you to the military, or Pepper finally jumping into bed with you. And even if you did buy into the idea of Obadiah going for such low-blow tactics, he would _never _send them after his protégé. Hell, he'd had you all alone on multiple occasions, at his mercy - and in those moments he'd given you the key to his part of the company, and confessed his own fears and worries.

If anything, Obi had been _protecting _you.

"You're wrong," you said clearly. "He is not the one you're after."

"_Mr. Stark -"_

"Don't _Mr. Stark _me," you snapped. "Coulson - _your lackey_ - told me you believe the bastards that kidnapped me in Afghanistan were connected to the attempt on Pym's life, and probably to _these _guys as well. Even if that's true, I'm not buying that Obi's behind it."

"_The attempt on Dr. Pym's life was perpetrated by the same people who hired the Ten Rings terrorist group, as well as Madame Masque and her companion," _Fury said slowly. _"They share a common source. That is true."_

"But that common source is not Obadiah," you concluded, narrowing your eyes. "Deadpool wasn't there to scare me at all, was he? Over in Vegas? He really _was _just after Pym. You lied to me to get a foot in the door, because you knew that I was your way in."

"_It was for your own safety,_" the Director said calmly. _"Deception for a good cause."_

"So says the inquisition?" you murmured, muting the channel. You would have to think about the trustworthiness of S.H.I.E.L.D. later - or how the different assassins and kidnappers were connected. Did they all have a single common master?

You had a way to find out.

"...Spidey, I'm probably concussed, so you'll have to help me out here," you said after a moment. "The woman - is she still there?"

Peter helped you up, supporting the heavy frame of your armor without visible effort. "I don't know, but I can swing over?"

"Yeah. Obi - we need him alive," you said. "Alive - and out of S.H.I.E.L.D. hands if possible. If they're convinced he's behind this mess, they might toss him in jail - and then we'll never figure out who's _really _behind all this." You nodded, wincing as a stab of pain erupted behind your eyes. "I _know _it has to be someone else, and I don't intend to let this lead slip."

"I'll… go find him," Peter said solemnly. "I'll be back in a minute."

"...Spider-Man," you said quickly, just in time to stop yourself from blurting his name. "The woman - we need to track her down, after all this - she's our lead to the bigger picture. There's some devices in my -"

"I got that covered," the boy noted quickly, swinging away.

Bemused, you looked on as the boy flung himself across the harbor with his usual incredible dexterity, leaving you alone in your dented suit, still smoking from the blast. The beeping noise in one ear was slowly fading away, and Rhodey's voice was audible vaguely from the headset you'd lost at some point, hanging by a thread from your shirt.

"Jarvis - what kind of dose did I get back there?" you asked.

"_Your radiation exposure was - limited."_

You frowned worriedly. "That's not what I asked."

"_...A Doctor's appointment is prudent - but you are unlikely to suffer radiation sickness from the dose. The secondary layer protected your vital organs."_

You let out a long-suffering sigh. "You're being unusually tactful about this, which means it's probably bad news. Gamma rays and whatever was in that unknown stuff, I'm sure. Do we still have the treatment kit at the house?"

"_You have never removed it."_

Despite the real risk of injury from the exposure, and the realization that you'd have to dig into your father's old emergency supplies, your mind wasn't really on the present at all. A strange, shrill song echoed in the back of your mind, in a miasma of light and heat.

"_Tony?" _Peter's voice came a few minutes later, subdued. _"I - found Mr. Stane. You'd better call an ambulance."_

The world seemed somehow colder than before.


	6. Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (3)

**Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (5 - 6)**

"Yowch!" you cried as you pulled a jagged piece of shrapnel out of your skin, wincing as blood gushed down your arm before you slapped on a bandage. The metal shard was actually a piece of the suit - a segment that had torn off, partially molten, and had then been forced right through the rest of the armor. Admittedly, you were a little impressed that it had pierced so deeply, even if it hurt like a bitch.

"Would you stop that?" the S.H.I.E.L.D. nurse complained, nose upturned as if she were perpetually smelling something disgusting - which admittedly was possible, given the fact that your own nose wasn't working terribly well at the moment. Such were the hazards of breathing in entirely too much potentially toxic smoke; everything had the vaguely nauseating scent of cooked ham. "You're going to bleed out if you keep at it," she continued. "It's no skin off my nose, but the Director would be _annoyed._"

"That sounds _terrible_." You smirked as you moved on to the next bit of metal that had torn through your armor, glad that all of the damage was superficial. Evidently, meeting an electron-beam head-on with a repulsor was a _bad _idea, and the fact that your arm had been closest to the explosion was probably why it had ended up so mangled. On the bright side, you weren't dying. And you had a hot nurse!

"Stop complaining," she muttered.

"Get off my back. I know _some _basic medicine, you know - I read stuff. A lot," you complained. "Did you people call Pepper yet? She's my secretary. Babysitter. She answers to both." You glanced across the docks to the other two nondescript trucks that had pulled up barely five minutes after you'd blown up the better part of the harbor.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had been rather late to the party, but they'd mobilized an impressive little army, with more than two dozen heavily-armed troopers pouring out to find that one enemy was out for the count - and the other gone. Honestly, you were a little embarrassed for the group as they trudged back to their trucks to deposit their heavy armaments without getting to use them. You were all too aware how attractive things that went boom could be.

"Agent Coulson agreed to handle your contacts personally," the nurse said with a flat stare, and you vaguely wondered if she really was a nurse, or secretly a super-hot spy babe with medical skills that was interrogating you. It didn't really matter, but it was neat to think about those things while you were trying to distract yourself from the pain in your arm. There were a lot of neat things to think about when it came to the nurse, actually. "Soooo… Are you going to think of an excuse for staring at my chest?" she wondered.

Yikes, she had noticed. "...You have nice boobs?" you tried.

She smiled, and the expression seemed downright genuine. "I do, don't I?" she commented happily, but then yanked at the next piece of shrapnel with rather more force than was necessary - you yelped at the stab of pain, and felt properly chided. "You have a habit of ending up like a pincushion, it seems," she continued easily, as if nothing happened. "Dangerous habit. I might not always be around to tend the boo-boos."

"Whatever you say. I'm still alive," you argued. "The radiation probably didn't do wonders for my health, but I've cracked more complicated problems than cancer. Probably. Sounds like it'd be fun." You stretched slightly, relieved to find that the flush on your skin was receding - for a little while, you'd feared that you'd ruined yourself, that you'd overlooked something. "Anyway, I pretty much punched out a nuke, and that's what matters. I won!"

"Hm. By some definitions of winning."

You scowled. "Hey, I _blew up _the guy that was trying to kill me - that constitutes a victory in my book! Oh, did I mention he was trying to kill me? Talk about getting into habits, _that's _one I really need to break away from." You frowned at the nurse's amused expression. "What's so funny?"

She shrugged easily. "You seem so surprised by all this. What did you honestly expect would happen when you strapped yourself into several tons of metal and laser-guns? You play in the nuclear bathtub, you're gonna get wet and glowy…"

"Har har." You looked over the destroyed waterside and the huge debris-filled crater at its heart, now surrounded by rather flimsy tape and a small army of suited gentlemen. It was a marvel that the mercenary with the big gun had survived the explosion - even with your suit, you'd taken quite a beating. Wherever he'd been shipped off too, you weren't sure. Didn't really care, either. What interested you far more were the bits and pieces of something scattered everywhere around you - the remains of the nuclear rifle that'd nearly done you in. Now _that _was something you could sink your teeth into, especially since Jarvis wasn't being his annoying self anymore, warning you of every rise in beta rays. The radiation source was gone_._

"Look, I know that I tend to run before I can jump, but you guys were slow as molasses so I had to do something_,_" you said at last. "When can I speak to Fury? This - mess - can't get a repeat performance. Given that I've ended up in situations like this three times in as many months, I think it's probably time I get some arrangement going. If only so I won't end up scrapping another perfectly good suit on its first time out."

You pouted as you looked back on the smoking remains of the Mark 1 suit - aside from its dented appearance, with large tears running down one arm and entire segments missing, the whole thing had caught fire not long after you'd managed to get yourself out, as electrical systems finally gave up and sparked into oblivion. The interior systems had not been fireproofed - until now, you hadn't really expected to take the thing into battle in this state. It was looking more and more likely that you'd have to rebuild the whole armor. You didn't mind that - but it was the principle of the thing that counted.

The sight of your poor, ruined armor brought you back to that moment when everything had died down, when the last of the bits and pieces of suit and gun had rained down around you, and everything went silent. Then Peter had sent a message - and carried out Obadiah as if he weighed nothing in his arms, arms hanging limply as blood seeped from his mouth.

"How is - Obi?" you asked, when it was clear that no answer was forthcoming about Fury's whereabouts. "You have him in ICU, right? He didn't look very good, last time I saw him..."

The nurse shrugged. "Well, he's lost a lot of blood, so time will tell the real extent of his injuries," she said calmly. "It's likely that he was exposed to the same nuclear source that you were - without any protection. There's some evidence of interrogation or torture, too. Beyond that..."

You'd heard those words before, half an hour earlier, but you still couldn't quite mesh that with what you'd seen. It sounded too clinical, too simple. Obadiah had looked like he'd been _sliced to bits _when he was carried out of that ship by Peter. There had been blood everywhere, and if the man had a pulse, you hadn't been able to feel it with your shaking hands. Whatever it was that these criminals wanted with Obi - he hadn't gone willingly, that much was clear.

That observation, at least, convinced S.H.I.E.L.D. that you hadn't been talking out of your ass about his loyalty. You honestly didn't care for the vindication, not right now.

"He will survive, won't he?" you inquired again, rather weaker than you'd intended.

The woman's features softened as she nodded, the tiniest of smiles darting across her face before she turned away. "I think so - our doctors are the very best. Right now, you should be worrying about yourself. With this much gunk in your blood, you'll be on antibiotics for _weeks. _Nuke's never been one for hygiene."

"_Nuke_," you said, more a statement than a question. "The big guy, huh? Fitting nickname."

"Yeah, it's been mentioned. It's never been this apt before," the nurse argued with a nod. "He's been on the files for a while, at least since the nineties. Never was a part of your company, as far as we can tell - but then, he's never been mentally stable, either. Odds are Masque was manipulating him. It's her thing." She glanced back at you, frowning. "You attract some dangerous enemies, Stark."

"Such are the perils of fame," you said lightly, smiling thinly. "Where's Rhodey? And - Spider-Man?" You'd almost said Peter. This secret identity thing was going to take some getting used to. "When that explosion went off, I thought I saw... I'm not sure what I saw. But they saved me from the blast, right?"

You didn't get an answer, but her vague wave towards the other trucks made it clear enough where you could find your allies.

"They're not in trouble, I hope?" you asked, realizing that you were being awfully demanding, even if you weren't getting answers to half your questions. "This was all clearly my idea. Neither of them are mad enough, I think, to do anything quite like this. Rhodey would probably have shot the guy in the head, no questions asked. And Spidey - well, he'd do whatever a spider can, I guess."

The nurse looked away, sighing. "I'm not the one to argue with. Director Fury will be around any minute now to debrief you and the boy," she said simply. "Until then - try not to get involved in any more tussles with dangerous criminals, please." She glanced up, smiling impishly. "Although I've heard you like to play dangerously. Vegas, huh?"

"That was self-defense," you argued, frowning.

She leaned back, smiling. "Yeah, I remember the last time I set someone's face on fire in self-defense," she replied lightly. "Ah, those were the days…" She slapped your bruised arm, and clearly enjoyed your awkward wince. "You won't die soon, so I'll bandage the rest in a bit - maybe the pain will keep you from doing anything too crazy."

As she walked off, clearly exaggerating the sway of her hips - you certainly weren't complaining - you couldn't help whistling. "Hello, nurse…" you whispered.

"I'm not a nurse. Call me Natasha," she said, twisting around slightly as she narrowed her eyes, and you felt a chill run down your back at that expression. "Or else."

Idly, you wondered if you had any room for another secretary.

* * *

Fury finally joined you almost an hour later, after you'd been ushered inside one of the trucks, where a rather lavishly decorated facsimile of a meeting room had been installed behind a big steel door. The first few steps inside had felt claustrophobic, and you'd distantly wondered why that feeling would emerge now, when you never felt like that before - until you remembered Afghanistan. This place reminded you of the weapons container you'd locked yourself into with Yinsen, just before you'd set off the Pyre.

You shuddered in disgust, rubbing your arm and marveling at the lack of pain. After endlessly complaining, you'd gotten something for the stabs of sharp agony that still make their way up your nerves, and the stuff was _heavenly - _like morphine without the dulling effect on the mind. Clearly, it was the proper _good stuff, _and you determined that you were going to stock up on it after all this was over - just in case. You were getting hurt an awful lot of late.

"Mr. Stark," the Director announced with a disapproving glare, and you realized it hadn't been the first time you'd been called. Perhaps the stuff _was _dulling your mind a little, then? Whatever. "Spider-Man," he continued easily as he glanced at your neighbor with a dull expression that was offset by his piercing gaze. "You two have made my day _very _difficult."

"Any particular reason you omitted the third part of our little party?" you asked warily. "Rhodey's probably the most qualified to talk to you…"

"Mr. Rhodes is not my responsibility," Fury said shortly. "You two, however, are a different matter."

"We totally apologize," Peter tried, still clothed in full costume, and he was probably much more at ease because of that. "We promise we won't kick giant super soldier ass for you again, okay? Fair?" He raised his hands in mock-surrender. "Oh, do you guys have those neat neuralizer things in real life? Because I could totally use one of those sometimes."

Fury simply glared. "As of an hour ago, I've had to terminate three news broadcasts covering the events of this evening, which means that there is video evidence of the events in question. Although the only footage is distant and indistinct… it's there. This is, needless to say, a _problem._"

Peter hesitated. "Am I…?"

"Jarvis?" you asked lightly, leaning back in your chair. "Do you have an analysis?"

There was a brief silence - then the radio propped up at the side of the room crackled. "_Yes, sir. All released footage is isolated to the last stage of the battle and only prominently features the armor, sir. The final explosion caused a localized electromagnetic pulse, and recordings terminate shortly afterwards. Spider-Man nor your person are visible."_

"Well, that's something_,_" you murmured. "Good job, Jarvis. Lock up the footage you caught, and delete all local feeds."

"_Already done, sir."_

Fury sighed, rubbing his forehead as he glared from his single visible eye. "Dare I ask how you hacked into a top-security frequency that you could never have encountered before? Or any of the rest of it?"

You raised an eyebrow, smiling enigmatically, and a silence lingered.

"Seriously, guys?" Peter asked at last. "I get that you're posing to be cool, and you're probably doing some kind of dominance contest thing, but can we get on with this? Because I have - stuff to do, and getting captured by the government isn't really my style."

"We'll come to _you_, boy," Fury said coolly, steepling his fingers together. "Stark - I commend you for warning S.H.I.E.L.D. about something that even our considerable surveillance systems had not yet picked up, but your handling of the situation was - troubling to me."

"Why?" you asked, mystified. "Everyone survived, except maybe some hirelings with a death wish that wandered into the electron beam of facemelty death," you protested. "That's not _troubling, _that's _awesome! _Spider-Man took out like two dozen guys for you to question, and the Nuke guy is my gift on top! I'd like to see you try and do the same without sacrificing half a dozen of your army dudes!"

Fury frowned. "Due to your actions, Mr. Stane is in a coma - something that might have been avoided if you had not forced Madame Masque to act sooner than expected," Fury said shortly, eye narrowed. "She poisoned Stane with something - and we aren't sure what concoction she used. Without a sample of the toxin and her delivery mechanism, we can only flush it out of his system every so often and hope that it stops reemerging."

"Some kind of self-replenishing poison?" you wondered. "How is that possible?"

"We don't know - but we've seen it before. We might have found out the details, had you not jumped the gun," Fury responded darkly. "Although your actions were understandable, I must insist that any future activity is coordinated with S.H.I.E.L.D. You were very nearly killed, and blundering into other operations could be a lot more dangerous still."

"Almost killed again - old hat," you said lightly, thinking back to the image you'd seen in the desert, that figure which held your body - Death. Between that and the strange near-death experience of the _white _that tingled below your skin, it was pretty clear that your decision to build armor had come none too soon. You couldn't really say you were sorry for anything that happened, though. You'd saved multiple lives, now, by putting your own on the line. It was a remarkable thought that you were even capable of something like that. "I'm not afraid, Director." It was the truth, remarkably.

"You should be," the one-eyed man snapped back. "You seem to believe you are some lone ranger in this crazy world," Fury spoke slowly, leaning forward in his chair as he glanced to Peter. "You do not realize that you are part of a larger universe, even when you see it unfold before you. Technology that would not have been dreamed of in science-fiction is now _science fact, _and the world is filling up with people that we cannot control - who cannot _be _controlled. We are approaching a breaking point."

You thought about that statement for longer than you expected. "Why?" you asked, unable to contend the point after your run-ins with Deadpool, Peter and Nuke - such data points that were unmistakable. Something _was _going on. "Why is that happening?"

"The reasons are many. But the truth is, it was inevitable," Fury said, sounding tired. "Your father saw it coming. He foresaw a flood of problems caused by this revolution in the way the world worked, back when he was working on - secret projects. I don't know how he realized what would happen, but sometimes it seemed as if he could peer right through to the heart of things, and grasp what nobody else could…" He tapped the large bird-shaped logo on the table. "This is why S.H.I.E.L.D. was founded in the first place. It is only through our head-start that we've been able to keep up with the changes of the world."

"Well, my father's come up a lot when speaking to you guys," you noted. "Is he the reason why you lied to me? Why you had Coulson make up some nonsense connection between the attack in Vegas and my kidnapping in the Middle-East?"

Fury glared with narrowed eye. "Mr. Pym was truly the primary target. Though we misrepresented the intent behind that attack to ensure that we had more information on your activities, it is incorrect to say that there is no connection. Pym was made a target due to his connection to certain classified dealings perpetrated by his former employer, Dr. Elihas Starr. Those dealings, I'm afraid, are very much connected to the weapon thefts from your own company."

"You are certain of that?" You raised an eyebrow. "Because I clearly recall you accusing Obadiah of that an hour or two ago."

Fury nodded tiredly in acknowledgement. "Starr is in custody - and now so is Mr. Stane, who we believe may have more information on the crime ring that's responsible, even if he is not as important as we suspected. Although S.H.I.E.L.D. has run into multiple mercenaries that can trace their employment back to the same source, which has proven very hard to pin down." He reached into his jacket and retrieved a thin file, filled with short biographical data. He tossed it onto the table and grimaced. "These are the known people connected to this particular syndicate. You may recognize a few."

"That's Deadpool," you murmured, recognizing the ugly mug that topped the page. Nuke, Madame Masque and a fellow by the name of Bullseye followed, and you curiously noted that Peter started at the last. The next few faces weren't nearly as recognizable, most of them wearing various outlandish costumes and paraphernalia - but one of them stood out. A severely burned and evidently comatose figure hooked up to a respirator, the only picture in the set that wasn't a mugshot. The photograph was recent, too. You pulled it out with a trembling hand. "This…"

You remember that face, burned as it was - you'd seen it before, just before you'd dragged Yinsen along to safety, away from wild gunfire in a sea of gas. This man had been the ringleader of the Ten Rings that had captured you out in the desert. He'd been out in the open in the end, right in the path of the greatest firestorm you'd ever unleashed - he had been caught in the heart of the Pyre.

And he was _alive_.

"How in the hell?" You asked strongly, staring at Fury with piercing eyes. You were certain the man knew what you'd done - his gaze betrayed his contempt. The terrorist had to have blabbed - and even without all the details, it was damning enough to know that nerve gas was involved. Either him, or Yinsen - and you couldn't imagine _that._But if the secret of Pyre's existence was out... "How did he survive _that_?" you asked, and Fury's sharp look was enough to confirm your suspicion. He _knew._

"There are - _theories_. Mr. Raza is in some ways unusual," Fury said after a long moment, glancing to Peter again. "We will not speak of that here and now. Suffice to say, he's secure_._"

"Yeah, until he breaks out and hunts me down for revenge," you said in annoyance, and you balled your fists before releasing them again, the slight shocks of pain that managed to pierce through the haze of painkillers keeping you on a necessary edge. "If this is all connected, then do you know why this group is after me - or their source? Why don't they simply kill me, since they've had plenty of chances to do so?"

"Hm. Evidently, they need something from you," Fury suggested enigmatically. "What they need - I do not know. They were willing to murder Hank Pym to silence him, but they've never struck directly against _you_. The kidnapping was the closest they've gotten, and even then they clearly intended to use you as a bargaining chip." He grimaced. "Needless to say, in light of these events I must insist that we keep you under closer guard, at least until we know the real culprits."

"So you want to keep an eye on me every day?" You pretended to consider that for a long moment. "Yeah, I'm thinking I'll do what I want, and it's not that. But I'll be generous - if you keep attention away from my friend here…" You glanced to Peter, smirking. "And you give me whatever's left of that gun outside to study - then _maybe _I'll play along for a bit."

"That gun is gone," Fury said mildly, not interested in the mention of Peter. "You destroyed the device, as you recall."

"Come on, I didn't destroyit," you protested. "I disassembled the thing. There's a difference! It's just a matter of getting the bits together, and some basic Lego-style reconstruction..." You shrugged. "Anyway, I'm game for having someone who can kick ass around, if you really think it'll help - as long as they're hot." You paused. "Is that nurse available, maybe?"

"...Nurse?" Fury repeated confusedly, eyebrow raised. "You will be informed." He glanced aside, his cyclopean gaze coming to rest on Peter, who fidgeted in his chair. "As for you…"

"I volunteer for ass-kicking duty?" Peter squeaked, clearly uncomfortable at being singled out and a little twitchy from being locked inside a metal box. "Well, as long as it can be somewhere in commuting distance, I can help out!" he continued. "Plane rides are expensive, you know..."

"I have jets to spare," you offered, rolling your eyes. "Anyway, let me take care of that_._ In return, you get to explain things to Pepper. And I'm warning you - that's gonna smart like you won't believe." You smirked. "Good luck."

"She wouldn't hit a harmless teen, would she?" Peter asked, miming a faint. "Surely your secretary is not that cruel?"

You sighed. "Yeah, good luck with that act. Idiot."

"And you're a smeghead," the boy muttered in return, crossing his arms.

Your incredulous gaze was mirrored by Fury's.

"...What? Don't you guys watch Red - Ugh, cultural barbarians."

* * *

"Would you consider moving to California?" You asked later as you lounged in the back of the car, amused at the uneven wobbling as the armor stored in the back was dragging the car down until it nearly scraped the road when you went uphill. The huge pile of little itty bitty pieces of gun didn't help, either.

Happy was driving as usual, and the bullet-proof, sound-proof shield was up between the cabin and the back, given you some much-needed privacy. It had taken more than two hours to come to arrangements with Director Fury - most of those had been spent haggling and making foul expressions You were honestly done with negotiating for the day.

Ah well. If needs must.

"Peter?"

The boy didn't answer immediately, staring out the window blankly - well, with the mask on there weren't a lot of other emotions you could detect, but you were pretty sure you were dead-on. Finally he turned slowly, and sighed. "No."

"Excellent!" you crowed, and the wide-eyed stare that erupted on the Spidey-mask was all too telling. "Honestly, I was kinda worrying you'd cave - because I think stealing the one proper superhero that the Big Apple has would be criminal."

"Hey - there's like - Daredevil, and Iron Fist, and Power Man - or whatever he's going by these days…" Peter objected. "And there's - a few other friends. They count."

"You would classify a guy going around in a fetish Halloween costume above you?" You shook your head. "Seriously?"

"He's like - broody and stuff," Peter protested. "And Luke - that's Power Man - has this whole fighting for hire thing going on. He's pretty much a badass."

"Yeah, I think I'll vote for the guy who just tied up a few dozen people without even getting hit _once._Why did I give you that bulletproof vest again?" You grumbled. "I could have used that thing for the extra protection…"

"You can have it back."

You waved vaguely. "Nah, I'll trade it for you when I've figured out something cooler. Keeps me busy, anyway. Or you could sell it - Reed would give up a few months of funding to get his talons on some of the tech in that thing…"

Peter cocked his head to the side. "Reed Richards? You wouldn't mind?"

"I wasn't serious," you complained, rubbing your arm. "Look, I won't ask you to move again - but I'm still offering you a job. Because I'm pretty sure you're a genius." You smiled. "I mean, I saw what kind of stuff you pulled out there - and that's amazing. Adding to that the fact that you're a science geek, and honestly I want to see what you can do with a lab. I suck at chemistry, it'd be nice to have someone around who is smarter than me."

"...You suck at it?"

You grimaced. "Don't tell anyone - but back in MIT, I got aB. _Minus._Dad wouldn't stop talking about it for…" You hesitated. "Anyway, I tried to improve on that, but the last time I spent any time working with chemicals I didn't have someone else design was, oh -" You thought back to mice and rabbits dying, one by one, as the gas reached them. "- twenty years."

"Tough," Peter murmured. "So what about this stuff?" He tapped his chest curiously.

"_That_I shamelessly stole from Roxxon. Don't tell anyone." You leaned back, closing your eyes. "And by steal, I mean reverse engineer, of course."

"...Are you sure you suck at this?"

You opened one eyes, smirking. "You reverse engineered artificial spider-silk, didn't you? Infinitely more impressive. So you tell me." You smiled at his silence. "A subsidiary of Roxxon recently went under in New York, and they've elected not to reuse the property. In fact, I doubt they want to get in a fight with Oscorp on home territory. That's probably why it was so cheap to buy."

You could feel Peter's stare through his mask, even with your eyes closed.

"Horizon Labs is not a subsidiary of Stark Industries," you said lightly. "It's just an empty building now, of course - but with a little money and some rebranding, I think I can make it work. I've been looking for a change of venue, anyway. Tired of the West Coast - too many murderous assassins in these parts."

"Are you serious?" Peter demanded.

"Not generally," you noted airily. "But in this case? Yup. There's a few projects I'm working on - and I've been setting up a new company to house them, one that doesn't have the stigma of the current one. I'm working off seed money from my own pocket, and I've got plenty to spend." You smiled at Peter's bafflement. "If you can't come to Stark Industries - I guess _it_will have to come to _you._"

"That's kinda creepy..."

"Says the guy in the bug pajamas," you returned blithely. "I'll get a bunch of people from my other labs to move over to New York - I've got personnel to spare, and I probably will move in. So if you agree, I'll toss you into that tank, too. You can start with - say - ten people working for you? How's that sound?"

The boy stared blankly through his mask. "...You're crazy."

"It's been said." You raised an eyebrow. "I have only one demand. Whatever you make - and honestly, I really don't care if it's spider-stuff or something - I want it to be _humiliating."_You gave him a thumbs up. "You know to whom, of course."

Peter nodded slowly.

"Right! That settles it. Welcome to -" you hesitated. "Right. We need a name."

"Webhead Industries?" the boy joked, sounding rather out of it.

"_No_ - and don't get a big head over this! Mine's large enough."

"...Too late."

* * *

You arrived home to an empty house, long after the sunset - it was probably four in the morning if not later, and even Jarvis was sluggish to answer. The armor, or the parts of it that still worked, has been stashed in the garage by the helpful lackeys of Director Fury, and you were only partially done getting rid of all the superfluous bandages that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hot nurse had wrapped you in for even the tiniest cut.

"I don't suppose I get a day off after this mess?" you murmured as you crossed the threshold, tossing your jacket and shirt aside as you made your way towards the bedroom, reluctantly diverting towards the kitchen as your stomach grumbled. "I feel like a ton of bricks right now, you know…"

"_You have gone to bed at stranger times,"_ Jarvis quipped lightly._"Might I suggest - skipping the afternoon press conference? S.H.I.E.L.D. offered to handle it."_

"Hm. Maybe that's just more reason to go myself," you replied, scratching the edge of the Arc Reactor in your chest as you hobbled to the refrigerator. It hadn't taken any direct hits during the battle with the latest adrenaline-fueled steroid monkey, but the jostling of the magnet wasn't particularly comfortable while the suit wasn't attached tightly, and your ribs ached from the stress. More shock dampeners were a given if you wanted to take it out for another spin.

Taking a long, disgusted gulp from the green gloop that Jarvis had cooked up for you - the funky mixture of radiation-treatment meds tasted like something that tried very hard to be custard, but gave up partway between artichoke and regurgitated bile. Basically, _ew._ Although it couldn't, of course, prevent cancer, the stuff went a long way towards preventing any other symptoms of radiation poisoning. It was also incredibly expensive to make - but then, you were rich for a reason.

"Jarvis, see if there's any television coverage, will you?" You said, dropping your cup in the sink. "I want to know if I should start looking over my shoulder all paranoid. More than I already do, I mean. And maybe I'll have to arrange a settlement for Peter or something. Like, an actual small village where he can live or something - he'd skin me if I got him unmasked."

"_There has been some coverage, sir, but none has linked Stark Industries to the explosion at the harbor. There was a brief mention of Mr. Stane's collapse in an unrelated bulletin, but that is the extent of current reports."_

"S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hard at work I see," you noted as you dropped your shoes somewhere in the middle of the hallway, hopping towards the door as you pulled on a stubborn sock. "Do they have a cover story for everything ready yet? The one in Vegas _sucked,_so.._._"

"_I have heard nothing yet, sir. Mr. Coulson is somewhat annoyed with me."_

"Because you didn't answer all his questions?"

Jarvis hesitated. _"He wanted to have a shot at the man you defeated, sir."_

"Heh. Good for him." You rubbed your eyes as you lost your pants somewhere in the journey to a warm bed, and then the rest of what was left. You thought distantly that you could really use a nice warm blanket - it was cold out, and your eyelids were drooping. The former might have had something to do with your lack of covering, but you were too tired to care.

"Wake me at eight - and not a minute earlier," Tony called. "Night, Jarvis."

"_Sir -"_

"I said: Night, Jarvis!" you called again, stumbling into your room.

"Mr. - Stark?!" Pepper's scandalized gasp finally clued you in as to Jarvis' hesitance, and you pressed your eyes closed. It took an extraordinarily long time by your standards to realize that you'd just committed a bit of a social faux-pas. In your own home.

Oh. Right. You were naked. And it wasn't a Friday.

You brought up your hands defensively, eliciting a second outraged sound. "Look, this isn't what it looks like - I mean…" You glanced down. "Okay, I _promise_, it was just a bit chilly outside, I swear!"

* * *

"What do you think of - hm…" You leaned back, still half-clothed and leaning against the backboard of the bed lazily. "Stark - Superior? Nah, sounds like I've gone full-on egomaniac, doesn't it? How about Stark's Totally Awesome Random Krap? With a K? It spells out my name, see?"

"You could have _died,_ Tony, and you're talking about company slogans?" Pepper blurted, her hands steepled in front of her, trembling slightly in evidence of her thinly-veiled anger. "You want to save your crazy epiphanies for the morning, and focus on the important things for three seconds? You are a self-destructive _moron,_and I can't just let my boss go up in flames!"

"...Yeah, that would cut into your salary," you agreed after a moment. "Also, I'm pretty sure you would be a suspect number for my murder, given your usual omniscience about what I do, so it would be a mess…" You rubbed your forehead. "I'm not dead, Pepper. I didn't die to random murderers the last two times, either. Yes, I have an uncanny knack for running into these idiots - but I also get myself out again."

"And how many times do you have to get lucky before you realize the next time might be the _unlucky _one?" she asked strongly. "You can't keep doing this to yourself."

"That's kinda why I built a big metal suit of badassery," you confessed after a while. "Rhodey told you about all that, didn't he? I figured he'd beat me here by half a night."

Pepper nodded, wiping her disheveled hair out of her eyes. "Yes. He's - told me pretty much everything, I guess. You, he, and your mystery guest went and saved Obi's life." She looked away. "I - I'm glad he's alright, Tony, of course. And I know that you'd do anything for some people in your life - for Rhodey, for me. But… don't you realize this is all _crazy_?"

You stared at her for a long moment, which stretched to half a minute. "Ever since the cave, I haven't really been - the same," you said at last. "Call me crazy - maybe I am. Maybe I got a few screws knocked loose in there. But I think I'm sane, and awake, and these last few months have just been glimpses of things I'd never even thought about before. It's like…"

"Tony?"

"It's not me that's breaking, Pepper. It's the world." You sank backwards. "In the last two months, I've run into several reminders of my dad's old work - ancient stuff, from the Second World War. Someone's continued it into modern times, it seems, and might still be making super-soldiers, people that can do the utterly _impossible_. There's whole spy organizations dedicated to that sort of stuff now, and a conspiracy to keep the details secret - and it all links back to _my family. _It has to mean something."

Pepper swallowed thickly. "And why is that?"

"It wouldn't make sense, otherwise. You've already guessed who my 'mystery guest' was, I'm sure," you murmured. "You'd be stupid if you hadn't, especially after Rhodey's involvement. Peter's way is one possible answer. He's a -" You waved your hand vaguely. "Call him a superhero. He's got a gift, all of that. He uses it to save kittens from trees, help grandmas across the street, who knows what else. He makes lives better, at the cost of having a dead-end job as a freelance photographer with scheduling issues." You paused. "And you won't ever breathe a word of that, understood? It's kind of a secret."

"Of course I won't…" She halted, staring. "Wait, you want to be a superhero_?_" she demanded then, incredulous. "I know you're like a moody teenager in an adult's body, but that's just - crazy!"

"Or fantastic?" you inquired slyly. "I didn't say that I was going to take his way. I just said it's one possible answer to the question I'm dealing with. The one that everyone's always dealing with, whether they acknowledge it or not." You smiled. "What's next?"

"Right," Pepper murmured dubiously. "...So, you're not going to be playing a superhero again?"

You smiled. "Not _playing, _no. But that's a question for another time, when my masterpiece armor isn't a pile of rubble that's ripe for the scrapyard. Right now - I have to deal with fallout. Not literally, thankfully."

You dragged yourself off the bed, the linen just barely hanging on as you strode across the room, pulling a few papers from under a pile of boring tax receipts. "I told you I wanted to start a new company before - for a myriad of reasons. Most of them are cool, though. I've got most of the paperwork drawn up already, because I've been thinking about this thing for a while. It's just that I want to make it happen, now."

Pepper sighed. "The Board's not _that _satisfied with you, Tony. That device you showed them is remarkable, but it'll take a long time for the expenses to be recouped. A year or two before all these experimental designs can be trusted enough to replace the grid. You've been given breathing room - not carte blanche. Especially with Obi out of the picture…"

You scowled. "He's not _dead,_Pepper. Some things would be simpler if he were."

"...Tony?!" she asked, startled.

You looked up and rolled your eyes at Pepper's horrified expression. "Oh, come on, you know I wouldn't wish that on the guy," you protested. "I just meant… with the company. Pardon me for focusing on the pragmatic. Obi gave me the key to his share of the company. in case he ever died. I've been thinking about that."

She blinked, surprised. "He… did? I didn't think you two trusted each other _that _well."

"He encrypted the data stick to hell and back, so it's not really a trust thing," you said, narrowing your eyes. "Odds are he's set someone up to monitor what's going on at the company, and he'll send the key after it's clear that Obadiah croaked. Seeing as Obi probably didn't plan on getting knocked out, his share is effectively useless for now. Until there's some ruling on it, it'll be me against the board."

Pepper studied you for a long moment, her gaze studiously remaining focused on your face all the time - she had a will of iron. "So, what do you want to do? Start a new company, at one of the worst possible moments?"

"The new company won't be under the board's direct control," you began lightly. "No oversight committee beyond the one I personally assemble, no contracts with government entities, clandestine or otherwise, without my express permission. In fact, it won't be a for-profit corporation at all, beyond the fact that I'll probably _profit from it._The end goal isn't the biggest possible income - but a high technology turnover rate. The vast majority of earned cash will go back into R&D, and particularly successful mass-producible projects will be brought onto the market with the help of various contractors."

"That's…"

"A Think Tank with a set of balls," you agreed. You smiled at her stunned look. "Pepper, I want to start on wholly new things, on projects beyond weaponry, and I have the money to make that happen. My personal fortune will go in as seed money, alongside a portion of profits from SI's non-military projects, hopefully. The entry price for high-tech is - well, high." You shrugged. "The Board won't like this stuff, of course, but they'll see the flip-side soon enough. In exchange for letting me go on this midlife-crisis soul-searching mission, if you will, they'll lose my direct influence on their actions as I'm busy elsewhere. Even if Obi wakes up again soon, they'll still have control."

"...And that's a good thing?" Pepper asked dubiously. "I know you've never gotten along with them, but you've been building in-roads. If you ignore SI…"

You winked. "Oh, the Board of Directors won't dare do anything drastic in the first few months, lest I come running back to save things - I'm still CEO. They'll get comfy as I stay away for long periods without messing with things, and aim for replacing me. Only then, when they're nice and calm and confident, they'll start to realize that I set up a yearly renewal for the rights on nearly all of my personal inventions. Of which they use a _lot._They'll end up paying _me_for the right to use their own designs, or they'll be forced to backtrack to the eighties..."

"You did that?" Pepper said, evidently impressed despite herself. "That's…"

"One of Dad's better ideas," you said, sighing. "He had other reasons to need a steady flow of cash to his person - but the idea was solid. The legality is murky, but nobody's actually dared to sue me over it. Probably since they don't know. The Board will try and toss me out as the CEO, of course - but at that point, I have no intention of still being the one doing that job." You glanced at her, shrugging. "They won't be able to touch my new gig anymore; I'll be more than ready then to break off, if need be, and let SI crumble in favor of my own alternative. It's foolproof."

Pepper shook her head. "...You really are crazy, you know that?"

You met her eyes and grinned. "Hey, how much do you want to bet that I'll build a bigger company in five years, than dear old Dad ever managed in his lifetime? C'mon, I'll bet you twenty bucks. I know you have some on you, I can see those babies hanging out between your -"

"_Tony._"

"Fine, it's actually fifty bucks - I wanted to make it seem like I hadn't been staring too long." You raised an eyebrow. "So, what gives? Are you in?"

* * *

"Stark… Ascendant." You stared up at the sky, tracing the lines left behind by airplanes in the distance, the stars nearly lost in the glare of the city lights. Even here, a little ways away from the really light-polluted center, there wasn't much to see at night. The Moon was there, and occasionally a few of the planets - but nothing too exciting besides. The last time you'd seen the Milky Way had been out in Utah of all places. "Stark… hm. Maybe ditch the Stark entirely?"

"You can take it out of the name," Rhodey said lightly. "Doesn't mean you can take it out of the company. Unless you go full hands-off and never associate SI with this new thing of yours at all, you'll get the backlash of your involvement whichever way we slice it. Might as well just take it on the chin and own it, right?"

You glanced over to him. "Probably. By the way, you were surprisingly lenient over getting on this roof..."

"I heard about it from Pepper," Rhodey said. "I think she's secretly a fan of this place - she does say you don't get enough fresh air. I suppose the top of your house is a better place to go than the usual." He shrugged. "Strip clubs get boring, I guess?"

"Not really," you protested. "I've just been…" You paused. "You know, every explanation I can give will probably reflect badly on either my masculinity or my age, so…" You made a gesture as if zipping up your mouth. "If you need something to pump the image back up to testosterone-fueled levels, you can think of that suit downstairs as the first step towards femme fatale sexbots, if you like."

"...Knowing you, that's not a joke," Rhodey muttered.

"Eh, the suit's a hobby. I wasn't planning on getting in a fight with it - the fact that I had it around was just fortuitous timing. If this mess had all happened a week or two earlier, I'd probably have arrived with Dad's old six-shooter and a taser. We got lucky."

"_You _got lucky," Rhodey said candidly. "I was nearly a mile away, there was smoke and a crazy guy flinging around on wires, and I still popped twelve with about thirty rounds total between them. All but one were non-lethal. I'll put that on my resume any day. Officially, I was never there. Unofficially, I got a commendation."

"And I got shouted at for six hours by the nanny of the our nanny-state," you muttered sourly. "The world's not a fair place, Rhodey."

"Says the guy who is rolling in money, can get any woman he wants, and is playing superhero on the side while building his dream-company. You're telling _me _things aren't fair?" He scoffed. "Where _is _my jet-pack, Tony? I'm waiting."

You smiled languidly. "It's in development. If everything works out, the first Stark equipment will be arriving in New York as we speak, and hopefully Muntz can handle the start-up issues without me. With a bit of luck, I'll have the Board's cash approval by Monday, so I'll be ready to spend a little time overseeing it right away. I - still need to tell Pepper, though."

"You haven't told her?" Rhodey asked slowly. "...You told _me_, but not your secretary?"

"It's - she's flexible, she really won't mind," you defended. "It's just that I was sort of thinking that since I'm moving away from my usual role as very visible CEO - she could take over some of my old duties… Just a few. Because I kind of realized she'd been doing a lot of them already. I was thinking - all the other ones, maybe."

Rhodey stared. "You want to make _Pepper _the CEO of your company?"

"I'm thinking about it," you said quickly. "There's other options, and I want to get a grip on this whole smuggling and assassination angle before I even dare put her on that stage - but I can kinda see it happening. Seeing as I fully intend to spend some time with my crazy ideas, and Obi's down for the count, it seems like a good idea to have a trustworthy and capable person in that role. I am probably neither, anyway."

Rhodey crossed his arms, frowning. "All of this isn't because of that - hothead reporter kid with secrets, is it? I note that he's from New York..."

"Peter?" You shrugged. "Not entirely, but I kinda suspect he's more like me than I realized. I mean, we already have the whole fast-talking thing going for us, and that's fun, but I think there's more at play. Like, I get the same vibe that I used to get from Reed, before he turned out to be a tool. I've got a good feeling about his performance."

"You hate Reed Richards," Rhodey observed dryly. "He's also a fast-talking smart-ass, come to think of it. I just realized that means you kind of, sort of, hate yourself. Shocker."

"Shut up," you grumbled. "Reed's an ass, but he's very intelligent. He has some good ideas, and given the right circumstances - I would totally hire him to pour me coffee or something." You smirked at Rhodey's expression. "Of course, the two of us have a bet going, and I figured it might be a good place for my new company to start. You know, a little friendly competition between two budget-limited organizations?"

"...Yeah, good luck with that," Rhodey said, sighing as he walked away to the edge of the roof, peering out into the evening sky.

The idea for owning up to the bet had been growing for a while, ever since the sneer-filled banter between you and Richards at the disastrously fated conference that never truly got off the ground. You'd joked about Reed's intentions, but in truth you couldn't fault the man from trying, again and again, to get his ideas out into the world. They tended to be impractically expensive and time-intensive, but they were, nevertheless, brilliant.

Reed's choice of focus wasn't a bad one, either - for the past few years, there had been rumblings in the space-travel community, dominated for decades by government activities. NASA and its foreign equivalents had done great things, but the inevitable result of bogging down exploration with a bloated bureaucracy, state politics and pork barrel projects, was that decline set in. Although things still happened, the timescales were stretched beyond recognition. Without the Space Shuttle, there was precious little in the way of manned work going on outside the Space Station.

Once upon a time, when NASA was young, and vibrant, and had more money than it had ever held on account of the space race, Man had landed on the Moon. It was an accomplishment that had been repeated half a dozen more times in the subsequent years - and then never again. The faucet of money ran too dry for such a huge project to be set up within a short timescale, like the Apollo project had been, and such expensive plans would never survive a political upheaval such as an unfavorable election. It was difficult to keep the James Webb Space Telescope project running - the successor to wonder-child _Hubble._ That said quite enough on its own.

That left, as always, the private sector. The reason that they had not already stepped in to do the job was the difficulty, and the _expenses._ Almost nobody had the cash to pour into space travel on a private level save a few eccentric billionaires, and progress was slow. The Holy Grail of cheap access to space had been a mantra since the dawn of the space age, since even Wernher von Braun's first concept for a three-stage launcher was fully reusable, and was expected to be recycled for launch in only 11 days. And yet - it never materialized.

The reasons for the stupendous price tags were many, but none were quite as staggering as the cost of the rockets themselves, the machines that turned an object on Earth into an orbiting one - the barrel of the gun. The tyranny of the rocket equation demanded that a huge amount of energy had to be spent to get a relatively small amount of mass up to speed, and that energy was transported in the form of gigantic towering canisters of fuel. And for each additional volume of fuel to take along into the stratosphere and beyond, one would need to account for the mass of _that_fuel as well. And it all had to be stable, and functional, and perfectly calibrated for the right orbit. And if things went wrong…

"I have a few calls to make," you commented idly, and Rhodey grunted in acknowledgement, sitting on the edge of the roof, looking down at the pool directly below and probably considering jumping in. It was still on the warm side - you wouldn't blame him. You dialed the first number you could think of that would be relevant.

Until this moment, only nations had really been playing the rocket game. There were some startups that tried, of course, but nobody could break the tyranny, nobody could end the stalemate between the spirit of exploration and the spirit of economic sustainability. There was probably one of those, you figured.

But now - now you had the repulsor. It needed development, and work - but you had just the company in mind for that. The repulsor didn't use fuel to make thrust, it didn't need an outside source the size of a building to blast off. You held the knife, the weapon that could end this enduring tyranny. And you'd do it by stabbing the king that was Gravity in the kidneys. A lot.

"_Yes, hello?" _the phone blurted.

"Hey there, Elon. You told me to call you when I had something to propose," you said lightly. "Well… I have something to propose. How's Wednesday at three sound to you?"

"_What's this about?"_

"Oh, nothing much, really." You smirked. "Just that the crown is mine. I cracked the impossible." You hung up. "Hah! That was satisfying. He was probably in the office, so I'll have Jarvis fetch the video later."

"_I am already recording, sir,"_Jarvis' voice sounded from somewhere below you. _"Mr. Musk seems agitated."_

"I bet he is - he just lost a thousand bucks - let's make it a two-fer. Give me the number for Branson, will you? I'll Skype him. And you know the drill there. If he's nude, please don't show me anything." You shuddered. "I never want to stumble across _that _again. Ugh."

"_Of course, sir. I'll be sure to delete this morning's local footage too."_

You pouted. "Did Pepper put you up to that?"

"_You know the answer to that question, sir."_

* * *

"Hmmm, 'Advanced Idea Mechanics' - you said this suddenly came to you?"

You nodded, stretching. "Yeah, I was just brainstorming, and I had to pause on that one. It's not really very Stark-y, but I think you can make lots of fun pokes at my old profession with an acronym like 'Aim' - as in, 'AIMing to the future, now' or something. Also, it has my profession in the name, which is awesome." You smiled. "What do you think?"

"It's pretty good," Pepper said with a fake smile. "So good, in fact, that somebody else already thought of it. About ten years ago." She rolled her eyes. "You must have heard the name come by somewhere, it's pretty big in biotech and the like. You're not nearly as original as you think."

"Do you think we could use like a variant on the name?" You offered. "I dunno, go with Advanced Ideas Mechanics? Maybe something else with the acronym - like, um, Artificially Intelligent Masters?" You sighed. "I'm joking, sheesh. Guess that puts me back with my number two again. Which isn't really…"

"Stark Ascendant sounds decent," Pepper agreed. "Bit preachy, maybe. You know, ascension…. People get a temper over possible religious references, and you're not really known for your, ahem, tact."

"I'm rich, I voted for Bush - both of them - and I love my guns so much I make my own. If that's not enough to get me in the door with the South, kissing the cross won't help any," you mused. "So, not going with Ascendant, then. We could do Stark Solutions, maybe? Revolutions?"

"Sounds like a cleaning product and domestic terrorists respectively," Pepper said blandly. "Anything more interesting than the first, and less so than the second?"

You sighed. "Stark Resilient has been knocking around in my head…"

"Too - honestly, it's too on-the-nose," she argued, scowling. "Everyone will make the connection with all the stuff that's happened to you recently, and they'll think it's all some sort of acting out over that. Probably not a good idea to remind people that you get shot at regularly. Bad for stocks."

"And for us." You stopped momentarily as a thought came to you. "...I think I know what to call it. Not Ascendant - but close. How about we go with Stark - _Transcendent_?"

"Yeah, that's not preachy at all," Pepper deadpanned.

"You can see the metaphor, right?" you asked. "Rising above the previous limits, over the very top of what people believe. Technological progress that breaks expectations, that changes things fundamentally. That's the kind of stuff I want to work on. Not guns - not anymore. An enlightened perspective, I should think."

"Yeah, you're pretty much Buddha now."

You smirked. "No need for sarcasm. You can tolerate the name, then? Stark Transcendent? I kinda need to know since I have to get the signs made." You raised an eyebrow. "Oh, and Miss Potts? You'd better start packing. We leave in two days."

"...Leave?" she asked. "Where?"

You grinned broadly at her baffled expression. "We're moving to the Big Apple!"

She stared long and hard before she finally turned without a word. You were pretty sure she'd be over it by morning. Right around the time she found out that half the building would be opened up again to reverse the computer upgrade that'd been installed just a week before - because you weren't going to leave your buddy's main core behind.

You hoped both Pepper and Jarvis would forgive you soon.


End file.
